Months of controversy and debate over Costco opening a branch in Guilford ended abruptly on Monday with the company's withdrawal of its application for a zoning change. First Selectman Joe Mazza received word of the withdrawal in the form of a phone call from company representative Joe Montesano on Monday followed shortly by a letter. Montesano told Mazza that the company had doubts that the site would work out and also that it wanted to avoid a legal battle.

"They anticipated a long legal battle, a couple years, even if they did get the first approval to finally get the project going," Mazza said.

The news came as a surprise, especially considering that the town had requested, at Costco's expense, three consultants to investigate the impact that the store would have on Guilford's finances, economy, and traffic patterns. The consultants have stopped their work, which was nearing completion.

"The disappointment I had is that it wasn't allowed to go through the process and have a fair hearing on it," said Mazza. "Costco chose to pull out before we got to that point, so that's the end of it."

Mazza is still hopeful that the site will be developed and has spoken with the developer Developers Diversified Realty Corporation (DDR) several times this week.

DDR "will pursue all options available to them to move ahead with developing the property," he said. "It's a setback but it's not going to derail us at all."

The zoning change would have allowed construction of the 150,000-square-foot store and gas station on the site at 1919 Boston Post Road known locally as the Rockpile. The site was previously approved for a shopping center, which would adhere to the Planning & Zoning regulations that state no store may be larger than 25,000 square feet (40,000 with special permit).

"They had the approval for a shopping center already," said Mazza. "There are certain options within the shopping center that they will explore."

The series of public hearings regarding the chain's plans for Guilford, scheduled to begin on Wednesday, have been canceled.

Costco Says:

Dear Costco for Guilford Supporter,

We appreciate your support for our efforts to bring a Costco to Guilford, however due to several factors we are withdrawing our application to the Guilford Planning and Zoning Commission for a zoning text amendment.

In recent weeks our team at Costco has completed additional work in anticipation of filing a detailed site plan application for its project at the Rockpile. During the course of these efforts, it became apparent that the development as proposed would not be readily achievable. For these reasons, we have decided to withdraw our application for the zoning text amendment.

Costco would like to thank the hard-working members of town staff, boards and commissions who have given their time over the past few months to review application materials. We would also like to thank the citizens of Guilford for their support and encouragement during this process.