The mayor of LaSalle says she’s excited to see construction start for a $200-million commercial development in the town.
Crystal Meloche attended the ground-breaking ceremony on Thursday at the site of The Shoppes at Heritage.
This development by D’Amore Group and Petretta Construction will see over 250,000 square feet of retail services at the corner of Heritage Drive and Sandwich West Parkway.
The project will see a wide range of stores included in phase one such as LaSalle’s first McDonald’s location, Tim Hortons, Food Basics, Dollarama, Shoppers Drug Mart, Pet Valu, among many others. Phase two will see a hotel development included in the build.
Meloche says it’s exciting to see this project begin.
“$200-million dollars, that’s a large investment. But we’re seeing so many different things coming to this site, there’s a possibility of the hotel, there’s a possibility of a gas bar, there’s grocery stores, there’s banking, there’s Shoppers [Drug Mart], there’s restaurants, you name it, it’ll all be here so our residents have that option to stay here instead of having to travel outside of the community to get their essentials.”
She says there is a lot included in this development.
“The hotel will be a great asset to the town, especially in its location with its proximity to the [Highway] 401, as well as to the U.S. border, even to the City of Windsor with the events that they host – often their hotels are sold out and this gives another option.”
She says there were a lot of hurdles with the project, and she wasn’t sure the development would come to fruition.
“We had to have a lot of conversations, even talking with the province because we have to do a lot of changes to the road system coming in here to be able to handle the extra traffic – but we got here. It really was a team effort, it really was Scott [D’Amore], his team, Petretta, their team, and the Town of LaSalle and our administration really willing to work to find solutions to some of the challenges that we were facing to make this a reality.”
Meloche says the town waived the development charges to allow this project to move forward.
A few of the stores are expected to open by the end of 2025, however the majority of them will open throughout 2026. In terms of the hotel, D’Amore Group will be going to town council for review in 2026 with a goal to start construction in 2027.
Once complete, the development is expected to generate around 400 to 500 jobs in LaSalle.