Construction is happening quickly on a new Menards store expected to be open at The Highlands by spring.

TRIADELPHIA — A blinking eye might have missed it, but a 200,000-foot home improvement super-store is sprouting at the far end of The Highlands.

Where there was just tilled landscape and earthmovers a few days ago, concrete blocks and steel have been set into place for a new Menards store.

The wait for activity at the site has been a long one. Officials with Menards signed the deal to purchase the land nearly four years ago in December 2015, and county officials have been anxious for construction to start ever since that time.

“We kept asking them when they were going to start building, and they kept telling us, ‘We’ll start when we’re ready.’ Well, they’ve started,” said Ohio County Commissioner Randy Wharton, also president of the county Development Authority. “It will be a magnificent store, and a great addition for us.

“I was up there (Sunday), and there were a lot of the blocks up,” Wharton said. “They also were putting up steel over the weekend. Construction is going a lot faster than expected. The whole project has been in the works for a long time, and it’s good to see them out there getting work done.”

Construction is expected to be completed by spring.

Menards sells home improvement products and tools, as well as grocery items, pet supplies, clothing and gift items.

According to its website, Menards employs about 45,000 people in 14 states, mostly in the Midwest. When completed, the store will employ about 150 workers locally.

Once open, resulting sales tax revenue from Menards — in the form of tax increment financing dollars — can be used to pay for a second interchange connecting Interstate 70 to The Highlands.