Vehicle Vending Machine Possibly Coming To Frisco
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FRISCO (CBSDFW.COM) - A company that wants to sell you a car online now wants you to come get it out of a giant vending machine. It may sound like a crazy idea, but city leaders in Frisco are a step closer to having one of the first of its kind.
At around 1.8 acres, the piece of land under consideration is a challenge for city planners because there isn't a lot of room for parking. Now the online auto dealer Carvana has come up with a plan to park cars up instead of out.
The company has built a giant model several stories high that uses robotic platforms to store vehicles and dispense them for customers who buy them online. The company already has one operating in Nashville, and Frisco could be home to the next one.
"Considering all the stuff that's getting put in around here, it just kind of makes it all the better," Michelle Perez said.
Perez lives in one of the neighborhoods close to Carvana's proposed site on Highway-121 just west of Legacy Drive. Before Frisco's Planning and Zoning Commission approved the project, the city asked Carvana meet with area homeowners to go over the idea.
"I'm not terribly inclined to think it would be a good idea," homeowner Mike Thompson said.
Thompson called the project a gimmick, but city planners are hopeful they've found a successful approach for a relatively small, triangular parcel of land.
"The upside, one, you get a use for the property, a challenging piece of property at that," Frisco Director of Development Services John Lettelleir said.
But some people on the commission did raise questions about the long-term impact of a tall structure placed in a prominent spot.
"I question whether the business would be viable, and quite frankly I don't know that you want to build a five-story, automation, kind of device that then in three years time find that it's not of any use," Thompson said.
"That does pose a really interesting question about what are you going to do with this, but hopefully it doesn't fail because I really don't see what else they could do with a giant car vending machine," Perez added.
Now that the project was approved by the planning and zoning commission it heads to city council members who will take a look at the plan at their meeting next week.
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