Wal-Mart's Latest Loop-hole

Last summer, officials in Calvert County, Maryland passed regulations limiting the size of big-box stores in the county’s historic town centers. But Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, appears to have hit upon a novel way around the rules: divide the store in two.In what company officials are calling one of the first arrangements of its kind in the country, Wal-Mart plans to build a 74,998-square-foot store cheek by jowl with a 22,689-square-foot garden center. The two Wal-Marts -- each with its own entrance, utilities, bathrooms and cash registers -- would have a combined area 30 percent larger than the 75,000-square-foot limit for a single store in Dunkirk.The tactic is the latest example of Wal-Mart's increasingly creative responses to the scores of jurisdictions around the country that have passed regulations limiting the size and location of big-box stores.