SUPER-SIZE SHOPPING WAL-MART, KOHL'S PLANNED.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

PALMDALE - AWal-Mart supercenter is planned and construction has already started on a Kohl's department store in a west Palmdale shopping center.

The new, larger Wal-Mart store is proposed in the second phase of the Destination O-8 shopping center on 10th Street West and Avenue O-8, where Wal-Mart Stores Inc. in August opened a Sam's Club membership store.

The Kohl's department store is going up in the first 35-acre phase of the shopping center, adjoining the Sam's Club.

The second-phase Wal-Mart ``supercenter,'' which would sell a full line of groceries as well as general merchandise, is also planned to cover 35 acres and construction should begin next year.

Plans call for construction of a 224,000-square-foot building - about twice the size of the west Palmdale Wal-Mart a mile away - for the supercenter.

The second phase is planned across Avenue O-8 from the first phase.

The shopping center's two phases combined will total 750,000 square feet - more than in The Marketplace at Palmdale a mile down the street.

A site plan calls for seven major stores and 10 smaller spaces at the shopping center.

``The interest right now and the quality of interest in the center is as good as they've ever been,'' said Mark McGaughey, first vice president for CB Richard Ellis in Glendale, the leasing agent.

The O-8 center is benefiting from interest developed among retailers over the Amargosa Commons shopping center, a half-mile south on 10th Street West, McGaughey said. Amargosa Commons stores began opening this month.

The center's biggest would be the 224,000-square-foot building earmarked for the Wal-Mart supercenter, followed by the 156,000-square-foot Sam's Club.

The Kohl's store under construction will cover more than 80,000 square feet. It is expected to open next spring.

``I can confirm that we are coming to Palmdale,'' Kohl's spokesman Steve Mann said Monday.

Wal-Mart officials were unable to comment on when the new store might open, or what will happen to the existing west Palmdale Wal-Mart store. City officials said they expect the west Palmdale store will be closed, since its location is too cramped to be expanded into a supercenter. They also said they expect the east Palmdale Wal-Mart will eventually be expanded, because it was designed with expansion in mind.

Wal-Mart said it plans to open 220 to 230 supercenters, 50 to 55 standard Wal-Mart discount stores and 35 to 40 Sam's Clubs across the country next year. Of the Supercenters, about 140 will be expansions or relocations of existing stores, the company said.

Wal-Mart has nearly 1,500 Wal-Mart discount stores and nearly 1,400 supercenters in the United States, plus more than 1,300 stores in other countries, mainly Mexico, Canada and the United Kingdom.

The Palmdale Kohl's store is planned as part of the Wisconsin-based company's aggressive expansion campaign that started in California earlier this year.

The chain opened 28 stores this spring in California. On Oct. 10, it opened 13 stores in Arizona and plans to open three next month in the Las Vegas area.

With the Arizona openings, Kohl's has more than 540 stores nationwide. It posted 2002 sales of $9.1 billion.

Wal-Mart's sales last year were $244.5 billion, counting all of its divisions.

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2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- 2 -- color) Construction has begun on Kohl's, above, next door to Sam's Club at the Destination O-8 shopping center on 10th Street West and Avenue O-8 in Palmdale. The store, below, will be 80,000 square feet and is expected to open next spring.

Jeff Goldwater/Staff Photographer