Second North Stafford Chick-fil-A to have larger kitchen, playground

A new Chick-fil-A restaurant in North Stafford will be one of the chain’s most extensive and updated models.

The restaurant will feature a dining room, a kitchen in the center, and a larger meal preparation area. Outside, drivers can use two of three lanes to pick up food from a window.

The new restaurant will also feature a playground for children. According to a company representative, Chick-fil-A will incorporate innovations used during the pandemic to serve customers during the age of social distancing.

The restaurant, to be built at the intersection of Garrisonville and Shelton Shop roads in North Stafford, near North Stafford High School, will be about 20% larger than another Chick-fil-A about two miles east on Garrisonville Road. That restaurant opened in 2001 and is closed for renovations.

The Stafford Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to grant Chick-fil-A a special use permit to operate a drive-through and to accept a request to remove a condition on the land that had prevented developers from building a restaurant on the site.

Supervisors rezoned the property to commercial land in 2006 with the vision of an office building and a bank on the site. Today, a storage facility, 7-Eleven, and a CVS Pharmacy sit on the property.

The new location will be similar to one in Lee’s Hill in Spotsylvania, across from a veterans clinic under construction.

During the supervisors’ meeting, some elected officials expressed concern about students walking across the four-lane (soon-to-be six-lane) Garrisonville Road to get to the new restaurant. Rock Hill Supervisor Crystal Vanuch asked Chick-fil-A to give $25,000 to the county sheriff’s office for pedestrian safety education and traffic patrols in the area.

A Chick-fil-A representative and attorney Clark Lemming, who represented the firm during the meeting, said the company would consider the request. The restaurant representative added the company regularly pays for additional police and traffic control measures during restaurant grand openings.

Drivers will access the restaurant from the intersection of Garrisonville Road and Space Way and drive behind a 7-Eleven store on the site. An existing entrance from Garrisonville Road into the 7-Eleven will also provide access.

The new restaurant will be Chick-fil-A’s third in Stafford County. Just 14 miles north on Route 1 near Dumfries, the company will build one of the most prominent Chick-fil-A restaurants on the east coast with a triple drive-through.

Like North Stafford, the soon-to-open location sits about two miles from an existing Chick-fil-A.