"Right-in, right-out, fine," Westfield City Council President Patrick Tamm told Costco's representatives on Sept. 28. "But if you're trying to make a left coming off of US 31, going in on 191st Street, there is no way this works. I mean, it's a non-starter." Current in Westfield reported the exchange, and it has defined the proposal ever since.
Most of the objections raised so far come down to timing. The warehouse could start construction in 2027 if it's approved. 191st Street is partway through a rebuild from a two-lane country road into a four-lane boulevard, and the city's own timeline runs that work into 2027 and later phases to 2028. The single turn lane everyone is fighting over is where those two calendars meet.
What Costco actually filed
Mayor Scott Willis announced on Aug. 28 that the Midtown at Westfield PUD, Amendment II, had been filed for the northwest corner of 191st Street and East Street. Current's first report laid out the city's project narrative.
- Building: about 166,739 square feet of warehouse retail
- Parking: about 899 spaces, or roughly 5.39 per 1,000 square feet of building
- Fuel: a freestanding station opening with 16 pumps and 32 dispensers, which could expand to 20 pumps and 40 dispensers, or up to 400 vehicles an hour
- Staff: likely 175 to 200 employees at opening
- Site extras: a retention pond behind the building, plus three outlot parcels seeded with grass for possible future use
The land is undeveloped now. Cool Creek runs along its north edge and is due for dredging, so the plan keeps a flood zone north of the building. At the Oct. 5 hearing, Costco Real Estate Development Director Steve Cross said the design adds a stormwater management basin to slow the rate of water flowing into Cool Creek.
Costco's traffic consultant, Andrew Garrison, told the council the store could see up to 9,000 customers a day during the week and more on Saturdays, counting fuel-only stops. Most of the debate since then has been about how those trips get in and out.
Why one left turn carries the whole argument
The site would have entrances on both 191st Street and East Street. East Street gets right-turn lanes at both curb cuts and a northbound passing lane. On 191st, a raised median, added at the city's request, would let drivers turn left into the lot while blocking left turns out onto 191st.
Costco wants to keep that left turn in, and Cross explained why with a single number. "We're going to have about 75 percent of our traffic coming from the west," he told the council. Making those drivers loop through a nearby roundabout to reach a right-in-only entrance, he said, would "congest the roundabout as opposed to just making a quick, easy left in there."
Councilors see the same 75 percent and come to the opposite conclusion. Traffic from the west includes traffic coming off U.S. 31, and the same stretch carries drivers headed to Grand Park and cars leaving nearby Westfield High School at the end of the school day. Councilors asked whether the traffic studies covered either of those peaks. Councilor Victor McCarty pointed to the Meijer on Ind. 32 as a similar setup and said he would not back a left-in, left-out access point.
By the Oct. 5 Advisory Plan Commission hearing, Costco had revised parts of the proposal. The facade now uses Indiana limestone, recycled materials and varied colors meant to fit with other Westfield buildings. Added landscaping went to the south end of the site and around the edge of the parking lot, and Cross said the plan goes beyond Westfield's landscaping requirements. The 191st Street entrance stayed in. Current's hearing coverage said the discussion lasted more than 90 minutes.
Two readings of the same intersection
At that hearing, McCarty, who sits on both the council and the commission, described what he had seen on 191st and East Street himself. He said traffic backs up from 191st to 186th Street after school dismissal and starts to jam on the 191st Street off-ramp from U.S. 31 around 6 p.m. He said the area isn't ready for another 9,000 to 18,000 cars a day.
Cross said he had also watched the intersection and seen backups, but that traffic was still moving and cleared "within a minute to 30 seconds." He said Costco will keep collecting traffic data and working with city staff.
A resident who spoke during the public hearing said her biggest concern was local infrastructure, not Costco. She noted that Grand Park visitors already use the 191st Street exit and said the traffic studies left out the apartments and townhomes going up along East Street. Councilors had made a similar point a week earlier. They said other planned developments along the corridor will add traffic, and they asked the city to consider whether the road needs work before more projects are approved.
That request points to something Westfield is already doing.
The road under the proposal is still being rebuilt
At his quarterly town hall on July 16 at the Westfield Washington Public Library, Willis called the 191st Street widening "probably the first project that I've worked on when I became mayor." He said it was only now "coming to fruition." Current's recap covered the scope.
- Tomlinson Road to Grand Park Boulevard: 191st Street widens from two lanes to four, with a new roundabout at Grand Park Boulevard
- Monon Trail: a pedestrian bridge carries trail users over 191st Street, due for completion in 2027
- Later phases: the widening continues west to Spring Mill Road with more roundabouts, with completion estimated for 2028
- Already finished: the roundabout at 181st Street and Grand Park Boulevard
Willis described the bridge as a safety fix. The 191st crossing is "probably not our most dangerous interaction with the Monon right now, but it's real close," he said, and he pointed to visitors who "don't understand roundabouts, they don't understand trails."
The City of Westfield's 2026 construction schedule projected utility work in spring 2026, roundabout construction this fall, and the rest of the 191st Street and bridge work in spring 2027. The city's Sept. 14 budget update listed the widening as continuing work. We did not find a newer public notice on lane closures or trail detours, so treat the fall roundabout timing as the city's projection, not a confirmed status.
Put the schedules side by side. If the Costco is approved, its construction would begin in 2027. That's the same year the Monon bridge is due, and a year before the westward widening phases are expected to wrap up. No opening year has been reported for the store. When councilors ask whether the road should come first, they're asking whether these two projects should overlap.
Everything else headed for the same few blocks
Costco is the biggest proposal on this stretch, but it isn't the only one.
- A second Wawa. On Sept. 21, the Westfield Plan Commission approved, on its consent agenda, a Wawa at 1519 Chad Hittle Court, at the southeast corner of 191st Street and Chad Hittle Drive. Current reported a 2.42-acre site in the Hahn Plaza PUD, a 6,372-square-foot store and eight pumps, with no construction timeline announced.
- Revere. Developer Thompson Thrift lists Revere as a 350-unit apartment community on 23 acres at the southeast corner of East 191st Street and East Street, diagonally across from the Costco site. Its status is listed as "Coming Soon," with no date given.
- East Street Towns. Lennar is selling townhomes in a community called East Street Towns, with a sales address of 1924 Werner Lane.
Taken together, this is the corridor councilors and the resident at the hearing were describing. A fuel-and-retail anchor, a second fuel stop, several hundred planned apartments and a townhome community would all feed into a road whose four-lane version isn't finished yet.
The calendar from here through 2028
Here's where the proposal stands as of mid-October 2026, based on the most recent reporting:
- Nov. 16: the Advisory Plan Commission workshop where the Costco proposal will be discussed again
- Dec. 7: the APC vote, as scheduled in Current's Sept. 30 report
- Dec. 14: the tentative date for the proposal to return to City Council, also from the Sept. 30 report
- 2027: the expected start of Costco construction if approved, and the Monon bridge's completion target
- 2028: the estimated completion of the 191st Street widening phases west to Spring Mill Road
We haven't found reporting since Oct. 7 that confirms or changes the December dates, and Costco has not publicly dropped the left-turn entrance. Cross told the council that Costco would consider the objection and then decide whether the remaining access would be enough to go forward with the plan.
If you live off 191st Street or East Street and want to think through how the corridor's next few years might affect your home, The Spillman Group follows these hearings closely and can walk you through what's approved, what's still proposed, and what's actually under construction. Schedule a Free Consultation and we'll go over the 191st Street timeline with you.
