judge ordered them to fix<\/a> in 2025.<\/p>\n\u201cIf you approve this project today, we will be back in court,\u201d Brannick said at the meeting.<\/p>\n
The 24 dock doors at the 47,000-square-foot Market Delivery Operation connected to the center eclipse other retail operations, Brannick said. He told GV Wire the scale of the project does not meet the \u201ccommercial\u201d designation the city zoned for the land.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor something as big as the Costco project, that\u2019s a gravity-shifting project in a bunch of different ways,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778198950_807_Costco-Map-7-2025.jpg\")
Map of the proposed Costco at Herndon Avenue and Riverside Drive. (GV Wire Composite)
\nNew Costco Not a \u2018Shadow Distribution Center\u2019: Shimko<\/p>\n
In its day before the public, Costco brought together a host of experts to explain what Shimko called \u201cthe evolution of retail delivery.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said the new design is Costco\u2019s newest prototype intended to meet changing consumer demands and not a \u201cshadow distribution center.\u201d<\/p>\n
A majority of the 24 dock doors are designed for box trucks \u2014 similar in size to U-Hauls, delivering large items straight to customer homes.<\/p>\n
For people ordering a bulky item, that could mean faster delivery.<\/p>\n
Normally, ordering an item may mean sourcing it from the company\u2019s distribution center in Tracy, driving it to an MDO in Fresno and ultimately to the doorstep. By Costco having an MDO in Fresno, the item could be already waiting in town.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you are having a party tomorrow and you come into Costco and say \u2018I really need a barbecue for my son\u2019s graduation party tomorrow and I have to have it.\u2019 It may very be well that that barbecue is sitting in that MDO in the store,\u201d Shimko said.<\/p>\n
Could MDO Reduce Vehicle Trips?<\/p>\n
Discussions around Costco\u2019s impact to the area became very technical. After a Fresno County Superior Court judge sided with Brannick about the environmental analysis \u2014 namely greenhouse gas emissions and traffic \u2014 around the project, the project went back to the drawing board.<\/p>\n
With the newer proposal, Brannick objected to the city\u2019s reliance on a 2014 analysis and state greenhouse gas goals.<\/p>\n
California law requires that projects do everything they can to mitigate environmental impacts. Considering the demand and shopping habits at Costco, analysts largely said impacts would be unavoidable.<\/p>\n
That includes the number of vehicles going to and from the site.<\/p>\n
Amy Lopez, consultant for Costco, said having the MDO could actually reduce vehicle trips.<\/p>\n
\u201cMultiple people receive a delivery from the same truck in one day and it is routed in such a way to be efficient for those drivers,\u201d Lopez said.<\/p>\n
Not all of those 166,000 trips would be new, either. The new Costco replaces the one at Shaw and Blythe avenues, diverting car trips from that crowded center to Herndon and Riverside avenues.<\/p>\n
Brannick told GV Wire that considering how much farther north the new Costco is, that could mean drivers traveling more.<\/p>\n
Where Did Fresnoland\u2019s $40 Million Figure Come From?<\/p>\n
Ahead of the Costco hearing, Fresnoland reported that the city \u201cexempted\u201d $40 million in Costco\u2019s fees under a 2025 Fresno program to mitigate travel miles.<\/p>\n
City staff not only disputed that figure but said no fees were exempted.<\/p>\n
In addition, Costco is paying more than $8 million in development fees, and city official estimate it will generate $15 million a year in tax revenue.<\/p>\n
As opposed to multiplying the number of daily trips by a $295 fee, as was reported by Fresnoland, the complex Vehicle Miles Traveled calculus involves project specific analysis looking at acceptable travel miles, and other mitigation measures, said Jennifer Clark, planning and development director for the city.<\/p>\n
City Manager Georgeanne White brought up that the city\u2019s entire VMT program only expects $20 million in the first five years.<\/p>\n
White also excoriated Fresnoland for saying the city exempted those VMT fees. The Costco project was submitted before the city approved its VMT program.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo think we can go back and retroactively apply something after the project has already gone through the process, those are the kinds of things that we all get criticized for,\u201d White said.<\/p>\n
Legal Liability of Approving Costco<\/p>\n
Matching the intended land use was a major sticking point for Brannick. With the MDO making up more than 20% of floor space, he said the city should go through the process of designating the land for industrial use.<\/p>\n
Karbassi, however, noted the improvements Costco would bring to nearby streets. Left turn lanes would be added along Herndon Avenue to divert traffic. Riverside Avenue would be widened, and truck traffic would not be allowed on the road.<\/p>\n
Spruce Avenue would be completed and on the east side of the project, Arthur Avenue would also allow access, receiving the truck traffic.<\/p>\n
In an interview with GV Wire, land use attorney John Kinsey with Wanger Jones Helsley said the state tends to defer to cities in interpreting its own zoning policies.<\/p>\n
\u201cUltimately, the courts generally defer to the city so long as that\u2019s supported by substantial evidence,\u201d Kinsey said. \u201cIn this case, the definition for general retail is pretty broad.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As local leaders, attorneys, and environmental experts attempted to navigate the uncomfortable truth that Costco generates a massive…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":326887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-326886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=326886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/326887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=326886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=326886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=326886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/GVWire-Ad-Get-our-mobile-app-1280x90-1-1.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n