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The fall, and rise, of Camelot Center
Rebuilding, ‘premium’ businesses planned

By Martha Elson
The Courier-Journal

The start of a $29 million project to revamp the faded Camelot Shopping Center at Westport Road and Lyndon Lane was announced yesterday by the developer.

The upgraded center will be called Westport Village, and about 40 specialty stores and restaurants are planned.

Jeff Underhill of Underhill Associates said yesterday that Camelot long has been an “underperforming shopping center.” He added that the previous owners invested little money in it, “yet the area around it is very affluent.” It will be better than when it was built 35 years ago, he said.

The renovation and redevelopment project is expected to take 18 months, Colin Underhill said.

At a news conference yesterday, he named six businesses that will be tenants of the revamped center: Heine Brothers coffee shop, Campbell’s Gourmet Cottage, Norton Healthcare, Thoroughbred Dry Cleaners, Gemelli Wine & Spirits and Glassworks.

The leasing target is “premium local businesses,” Jeff Underhill said. The first new businesses in the center are expected to open May 1 of next year.

Heine Brothers co-owner Mike Mays said the area farther east, in the vicinity of the Gene Snyder Freeway, is filled with high-end development and the Westport Village area seems like a natural site for more.

“It’s ripe for a neighborhood gathering place,” he said.

Jan Ploetner, a resident of Eagle Creek condominiums on Westport Road, said she is looking forward to being able to “walk up here and get coffee and eat and just mill around.”

Barbara Stone, a resident of Dudley Square retirement community across Lyndon Lane from the center, said she was stunned by the proposed new look of the center in renderings displayed yesterday.

“It’s very grand, very English and very attractive,” she said.

Studio A Architecture worked on the design.

Metro Councilmen Ken Fleming and Glen Stuckel said at the event that they will allocate $80,000 from their neighborhood funds for sidewalks along Herr and Lyndon lanes adjacent to shopping center.

The event ended with a balloon release and wrecking equipment tearing off part of a current building.

The redevelopment project will involve significant improvements to four standing buildings, construction of two new ones and some demolition. Among the handful of current tenants, Curves for Women, Bikram Yoga, East End Aquatics and Jade Palace will be staying.

All leases will be honored, and talks are continuing with some other tenants, Jeff Underhill said.

Subway restaurant manager Al Ellington joked that his was one of the few stores left. “We’re one of the dinosaurs,” he said.

The center is in St. Matthews and Graymoor-Devondale.

“It needs overhauling,” said St. Matthews Councilman Rick Tonini. “We’ll be thrilled to have new life in this center.”

The redeveloped center would be a plus for the whole area, said Windy Hills Mayor Lou Phillips. “It’s just a hop, skip and a jump” from his city’s Westport Road entrance, he said.

Lyndon Mayor Susan Barto said she would like to see a grocery. A specialty grocery is proposed, but Colin Underhill said he is not ready to name it.

Mayor Jerry Abramson said the planned redevelopment ties in with the city’s Corridors of Opportunity in Louisville program, which seeks to revitalize commerce along major roads.

Underhill Associates also has been converting the 30-plus-years-old Camelot East Apartments into the Westport Gardens condominiums across Herr Lane from the shopping center.

Westport Road has been widened in the area and a new interchange with the Watterson Expressway is planned. That is expected to greatly increase traffic going past the center.