Grassfield's to expand without affecting business neighbors

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October 29, 2009

Restaurant expects facelift for plaza

By Judy Wakefield

You might say the Main Street makeover is not really over. It's just moving north to Shawsheen Plaza, the town's largest shopping mall.

Grassfields restaurant will be the first to be made over. It hopes to add 65 seats and enlarge its bar area. Company spokesman Mark Mininos said it's not official, but the whole plaza off North Main Street will most likely get a face-lift when Stop & Shop opens in the space currently leased by Market Basket. That lease expires in 2011. Stop & Shop announced last February that it will be moving in.

Grassfields plans to be ready, and has expansion plans are in the works. Renovation plans do not include expanding into the next door business space at least one town official had believed. Ken Traub, owner of Arrow Floor Carpet One, located next to Grassfield's, said his business will remain in its current location.

"I am not leaving," said Traub, a longtime town resident who has been in business in Shawsheen Plaza since 2000. "We're under lease."

Selectmen have renewed the restaurant's liquor license for a larger bar while the town's health and planning departments are working with restaurant officials on the expansion.

Mininos, the spokesman for Grassfields, said the expansion plans do not require taking over any space leased by business neighbors. No parking spaces will be lost, either. A back wall to the right of the restaurant's front entrance will be pushed out. He said the company will be using space it already leases.

"None of our neighbors will be affected," he said. "I think when Stop & Shop arrives, this whole plaza will get a facelift and it will be good for all the neighbors. That's what I'm hearing. No one is moving (because of the expansion)."

Grassfields opened in 1986 and its expansion is being cheered by some as encouraging news in this economy.

But Mininos stressed the expansion is not going to be rushed and still has to cross some town hurdles.

Documents on file in the town's Planning Department show that these issues must be addressed:

The sanitary sewer service must be jet cleaned and vacuumed from the building to the main sewer line on North Main Street due to grease build-up from the kitchen.

An exterior grease trap must be installed.

Health Director Tom Carbone wrote to the planning department on Oct. 13 that he "has heard discussion of possible outdoor seating" at Grassfields. The restaurant has not submitted any plans for this and they must do that before any seats can go outside, he wrote.

Mininos is optimistic that all of the town's requests will be met.

"We really like Andover and have wanted to do this for a long time. I think it will be good (for the Plaza)," he said.