Wal-Mart comes to Marple

As I write this I assume customers are pouring into the county’s newest Wal-Mart.

And I also assume there are not shortage of people still seething at the thought.

Wal-Mart opened its newest store in the Marple Crossroads Shopping Center at 7:30 a.m.

The doors opened over the objections of several neighbors’ groups who wanted no part of a Wal-Mart in their back yards.

This is not your usual massive big box store. It’s something called a ‘prototype size,’ with wider aisles. It actually sits in what used to be empty store space.

Oh, and one other thing. The store brings with it 300 employees, 55 percent of whom are working full-time. About 40 percent of those workers are from Delaware County.

None of which is going to make the people who opposed it any happier.

Nor will it likely quiet the protests of union members who chafe at the kind of employment – and pay – that Wal-Mart provides.

I will be interested to see just how bad traffic gets in what is already a fairly harrowing experience at a very busy intersection with Route 1.

None of that could stop the familiar rallying call for bargain hunters: Attention Wal-Mart shoppers. They’re up and running in Marple.

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