Planet Fitness Planned For Bay View

Planet Fitness at 121 W. Oklahoma Ave. Rendering included on permit request by Stratford Sign Sales.

A Planet Fitness gym is slated to open near S. Chase Ave. and W. Oklahoma Ave. on the edge of Bay View.

The gym chain is marketed as a low-cost “Judgement Free Zone” that caters to casual users. Membership starts at $10 per month.

The new gym would fill the space last occupied by a Family Dollar store, 121 W. Oklahoma Ave. The discount retailer closed the location last summer.

The shopping center property, addressed as 123 W. Oklahoma Ave., is anchored by a Piggly Wiggly grocery store. A Goodwill store is located at its western edge. The property, excluding the outlot buildings along W. Oklahoma Ave., is owned by PJR Properties, an affiliate of Piggly Wiggly.

A commercial alteration permit says Arkanas-based PB2 Architecture & Engineering is designing the 12,995-square-foot gym. A sign permit shows minimal visual changes to the exterior of the building, with the notable exception of purple Planet Fitness signage.

Mid-America Real Estate Group brokers Adam Dreier and Tony Colvin represented the franchisee, Neenah-based Black Duck Partners (BDP), in the lease negotiations. The brokers also represented BDP in leasing space for a second new Planet Fitness gym in Brookfield at the Shops on Bluemound, 16085 W. Bluemound Rd.

BDP, according to its LinkedIn page, owns and operates more than 120 franchised Planet Fitness gyms in Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, New York, Georgia, South Carolina, Texas, Nevada, Arizona and Canada. That’s an increase of 50 from 2021 when it filed permit requests to build a new facility at W. Good Hope Rd. and N. 76th St. Planet Fitness reports more than 2,000 locations from Canada south to Central America.

The Chase and Oklahoma shopping center has seen substantial change beyond the closure of Family Dollar. An outlot parcel in front of the future gym was occupied by an Arby’s fast food restaurant for two decades before a UW Credit Union replaced it last year. A new outlot building, owned by PJR, was built behind the grocery store and Family Dollar space during the pandemic. The only tenant to open in the multi-stall building to date is an AT&T cell phone store.

The nearest Planet Fitness gyms to the proposed Bay View location are at 4698 S. Whitnall Ave. in St. Francis and 3565 S. 27th St. in Milwaukee. The new gym would be the eleventh Planet Fitness in Milwaukee County.

Photos and Rendering