Will retailer fight city’s denial of Chatham Market plan? Residents, local alderman stand ready to back big store.

On a windy Wednesday morning in March, a steady stream of shoppers bustle in and out of the Lowe’s at 83rd Street just west of the Dan Ryan Expressway on Chicago’s South Side.

The parking lot, decorated with a black wrought iron fence and rows of freshly planted trees, is filled with more than 100 cars ready to transport a range of purchases: windshield wiper fluid, toilet seat covers, Easter lilies and sheets of drywall.

Steps away sits a vacant swath of dirt occupied by only a few birds standing in puddles. It is here that Wal-Mart Stores Inc. wants to build its second city store. Late last week, the City of Chicago declined a request to allow Wal-Mart to build a store at the 50-acre Chatham Market, a shopping center being built at the site of the former Ryerson Tull steel plant.