WEST HAVEN, Weber County — As West Haven has grown, Mayor Rob Vanderwood has noticed at least one glaring issue.
The city is home to nearly 25,000 residents, “and we don’t have a grocery store,” he said. To do their shopping, residents “go to surrounding towns, and that’s been the frustration.”
Not for long, though. Amid the surging population in West Haven, one of the fastest-growing cities in Utah since 2020 and the fastest-growing locale in Weber County in the period, a Walmart Supercenter is coming, the city’s first grocery outlet. The West Haven City Council approved the site plans for the store on Wednesday, and a groundbreaking ceremony is expected in September.
“It’ll be huge for West Haven,” Vanderwood said. With much of the land around the Walmart site at 4227 S. Midland Drive undeveloped, he anticipates the retail outlet, once complete, will serve as a magnet to additional commercial development. Walmart, moreover, is planning to build an accelerated pickup and delivery center at the site to process online orders, he said.
As the population expands in the more western expanses of Weber County, where developable land is most plentiful, the planned 176,000-square-foot Walmart isn’t the only indicator of commercial potential. Officials in Hooper, just to the west of West Haven, have been debating a mixed-use development proposal from developer Terra Strada that includes a 123,000-square-foot Smith’s Marketplace.
As is, Hooper is home to a gas station with a small convenience store, but, as far as retail goes, not much more. The development, which includes five additional adjacent retail pads and 117 housing units, would bolster the city’s sales tax revenues, notes Mayor Sheri Bingham. Notably, it would also give locals a place to shop without having to travel to other larger cities.
“Some say, ‘Oh, yes, you can drive to West Haven, you can drive to Roy, you can drive to Clinton,’ and we can. But I don’t feel like that’s being very responsible of us as a city to not provide any resources. It would not only be a grocery store, but there would be probably a bank, probably a restaurant or two, some fast-food restaurants,” she said.
Unlike the West Haven Walmart plans, though, the Smith’s Marketplace proposal faces continued deliberation by Hooper officials, who have yet to sign off on a zoning change needed for the plans to proceed. Among the issues to be settled is whether to create a community redevelopment area in conjunction with the proposal to generate public tax-increment finance funding to help cover the cost of building a needed $2.3 million to $3 million sewer lift station.
Creation of the redevelopment area and use of property tax funds for the sewer infrastructure “is justified,” reads a consultant’s report on the plans. Use of public funds “would more than be offset with the fiscal revenues (benefits) created by this development.”
That’s not the only potential sticking point. The Hooper area has historically been an agricultural stronghold, and some have expressed reticence at the possible coming of a commercial cluster.
“My father was a dairy farmer. I have a son that still farms full time, and so I feel really strongly about keeping Hooper rural,” said Bingham, who favors the proposal. “Along with that, though, Hooper is changing. From the time since we became a city 25 years ago, our population has significantly increased, so it is going to change.”
The changing face of the west Weber County area into a more suburban setting has been the focus of debate over the years in West Haven and beyond as well. At any rate, Vanderwood doesn’t deny the likely change in the area around Walmart off busy Midland Drive, already home to more and more apartment buildings and other housing units. “They’re really going to dominate that area pretty heavily,” he said.
Similarly, West Haven City Councilwoman Nina Morse suspects the Walmart could draw other retail outlets and restaurants.
“They have owned that property for more than two decades, so we are excited to finally see this plan come to life,” she said. “It’s a great anchor for other businesses.”
West Haven’s population since 2020 has grown 43.5% to 24,617 as of 2024, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates. That’s the third-largest growth rate in Utah behind tiny Hideout and Saratoga Springs. Hooper’s population has grown from 9,112 to 9,548 in the span, up 4.8%.
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