By TIM LANDIS
BUSINESS EDITOR

For the second time in a month, Wal-Mart has asked local planners to delay consideration of a proposed superstore on Wabash Avenue.

The Sangamon County Regional Planning Commission had been scheduled to consider the project at its monthly meeting today. But a letter from Wal-Mart's engineers asked for an indefinite postponement without offering specifics.

"They just simply said they would like it to be tabled until further action is requested. It was not a withdrawal of the plan," Dave Kiliman, assistant director of the regional planning board, said Tuesday.

The Wabash project has touched off strong opposition from residents in nearby subdivisions who say a superstore would create safety, drainage and traffic problems.

About 100 residents showed up at a city Planning and Zoning Commission hearing last month, only to learn just before the meeting that Wal-Mart had withdrawn a rezoning petition for part of the 30-acre site.

The latest postponement has sparked speculation that the retailer is about to abandon the site or consider other locations. But developer John Barber, who helped negotiate Wal-Mart's plans for the Wabash location, said he has not been told of any change.

"As far as I know, they're still on track to do something. At least, they haven't told us any different," he said, adding that the company needs additional time to answer questions about traffic and drainage.

Calls to Wal-Mart's corporate offices were not returned Tuesday.

The chairman of the Southwest Springfield Neighbors Association, which is leading opposition to the project, said he was encouraged by the latest postponement, but the group will continue its efforts.

"I guess our feeling was that, at least this is one sign, perhaps they were going back and doing some additional homework," said Roger Kanerva, who has lived in the Cobblestone Estates subdivision, immediately north of the site, since 1996.

Kanerva said the group has collected about 1,000 signatures from residents in nearby subdivisions and plans to make the petitions part of a formal objection to the project.

"At this point, we haven't heard that they've withdrawn from this site altogether," he said. "This (postponement) was kind of a vindication that the issues we've been raising in the last month were probably pretty real."

Wal-Mart also has announced plans for a superstore on South Sixth Street at Hazel Dell Road, though the company has not yet filed for zoning approval. A superstore on North Dirksen Parkway opened in 2001.

The Wal-Mart in the Parkway Pointe shopping center opened in 1991.