Mobile's City Council denied Food Pak's request to rezone a wooded lot at 5070 Old Shell Road for a store. The lot in Spring Hill stays zoned for single-family homes.

The Mobile City Council on Tuesday denied a request to rezone a lot at 5070 Old Shell Road in Spring Hill for a store. The land stays zoned R-1, for single-family homes.

The applicant, Food Pak Inc., asked to change the lot to B-2, the city’s neighborhood business zoning. The council voted by voice to deny ordinance 64-041, according to the city’s video of the Nov. 10 meeting. The minutes, which will record the vote, are not yet posted.

The Mobile Planning Commission had already denied the request on Sept. 17, according to its letter of decision.

What was proposed

The planning staff report describes the plan as:

  • a retail building of about 8,600 square feet
  • eight parking spaces
  • an outdoor dining area
  • access from Parkway East and Border Drive East

The lot sits between those two streets, with Lavretta Park across Parkway East to the west. Every property around it is zoned R-1. It is in the Spring Hill Overlay, which allows some limited retail but, the report says, does not itself create commercial zoning.

The report says the site plan did not meet some overlay rules. Food Pak applied separately to the Board of Zoning Adjustment for a variance on those points.

Why the planning commission said no

The commission’s letter gives these reasons:

  • there was no mistake in the lot’s original zoning
  • a store would not fit the area’s development trends or surrounding uses
  • it would hurt neighboring properties and their values
  • the infrastructure is not in place to serve it
  • nothing has changed in the area to justify the change

What was said Tuesday

The property’s owner told the council the business has been in the neighborhood for 35 years. The owner said Food Pak runs with three or four people and had offered to shrink the building to 6,000 square feet. The owner said the land was once commercial and is near other commercial activity.

Several neighbors spoke against the rezoning. One, who lives about 200 feet away, said the request failed to meet any of the city’s objective tests for a more intense zoning.

A council member who spoke for denial said the store is a long-standing Spring Hill business whose lease is not being renewed, and that the member was sympathetic. But the member said zoning stays with the land, so a B-2 lot could later hold any business the district allows. The member said 87% of the letters from people living nearby opposed the change.

The lot’s history

The staff report traces the site back more than 80 years:

Year What happened
1943 Recorded in the Country Club Village subdivision as “Commercial Lot B”
1956 Annexed into the city of Mobile
1967 Zoned R-1 under the city’s first zoning ordinance
2017 Board of Zoning Adjustment denied using it as parking for a restaurant at 5054 Old Shell Road
Dec. 2025 Planning commission denied a six-lot subdivision that included it
March 2026 Planning commission gave a six-lot subdivision tentative approval

The lot across Border Drive East was once a nonconforming auto repair shop. It won a use variance in March 2018 to become a restaurant, the report says.

A required neighborhood meeting was held July 24 at the Lavretta Art & Culture Center. Fifteen members of the public who were not part of the application signed in, the report says.

What it means for you

If you live in Country Club Village or along Parkway East, nothing changes: the lot stays zoned for houses. Any business on it would need a new rezoning request, starting again at the planning commission. To see what each zoning class allows or how to comment on a case, read our guide to building permits and zoning in Mobile.

Rezoning cases in Mobile go first to the Planning Commission, which posts staff reports and decisions on buildmobile.org. Its next meeting is Thursday, Nov. 19.