In Exton area, an explosion of building activity
West Whiteland Township has 23 projects in various stages of completion. Many are for new housing units.
WEST WHITELAND » Call it the development of Exton, 2.0.
The area is undergoing a renewed interest with development that has the township buzzing with new projects.
From a new supermarket – a Whole Foods, which the township has been told will open in January – to a postoperation rehabilitation facility, with plenty of housing in between, the Exton area is a hot spot for building again with more than 20 projects in the ground or on the drawing board.
“There’s a lot happening now,” observed Mimi Gleason, West Whiteland’s township manager. “A lot of it is because of the economy, the pent-up demand, and a lot of it is because the three supervisors we have now wanted to encourage redevelopment.”
The completion of the Exton Square Mall in 1973 helped put the Exton area on the map and through the decades leading up to the 2008 Great Recession the township saw steady growth with the development of other retail centers like Whiteland Towne Center, Fairfield Place, Festival at Exton and Main Street at Exton.
While some of the projects before the township or recently approved are small – parking lot expansions and modest additions – others are substantial.
Much of the new construction is centered on housing, including:
• Keva Flats (Marquis at Exton) – A Hankin Group project of 240 apartments in five buildings along Lincoln Highway between Otto’s Mini and Whiteland Towne Center;
• Lochiel Farm, a Bentley Homes proposed subdivision of 140 townhomes and the renovation of two existing historic structures for single-family homes next to SS. Philip and James near Ship Road;
• Parkview at Oaklands, a 291-unit apartment complex in four buildings just south of the Festival at Exton shopping center and west of South Whitford Road;
• Reserve at Ashbridge, in the Main Street at Exton center, will bring 410 apartment units within six buildings along Commerce Drive, Indian Run Road and Woodcutter Street,.
• The former Waterloo Gardens property, which is targeted for 86 carriage homes along North Whitford Road.
• Dante’s Run, seven single-family residential units along Burke Road, north of Pierce Middle School, which is under construction;
• Glen Loch II, a subdivision of 108 carriage homes along Dunwoody Drive between King Road and Phoenixville Pike, which has been approved;
• Harry Simon Estate, eight single-family homes along Grove Road between Boot Road and Stewart Drive;
Those projects, along with a proposed New Horizons Montessori Academy, a proposed Boy Scouts of America Building, a new hotel, a new CVS drug store and – of course, the new Whole Foods – is reminiscent of the earlier frenzy of building activity in the area in the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s.
It is a far cry from 2008, when development in the township came to a “screeching halt,” Weller recalled during a recent interview at the West Whiteland Township Building.
“For several years we didn’t approve a single housing unit – none,” said John Weller West Whiteland zoning officer. “So there is a pent-up demand.”
“Some of this is location, location, location,” Gleason added.
Some of it also is a streamlined plan approval process, Gleason said, a directive given to the staff by the supervisors.
She said Weller helps guide developers through the process, letting them know early if their plans would stand a chance for approval.
“Plans can be a six-figure proposition themselves, so they usually check before presenting them,” Gleason said.
When the township updated its Comprehensive Plan in early 2015, it confirmed development should be concentrated along the routes 30 and 100 corridors, leaving the “outer for lower-density development.
“The development that’s happening now is consistent with that,” Weller said.
But the strength of the rebound has caught even the pro-development township officials by surprise.
“While I think everyone realizes that redevelopment is key to maintaining our economic vitality, we’re all a little surprised at how quickly the development community has responded to both the new zoning and the improved economy,” the zoning officer said. “We have had questions about whether this is ‘too much,’ and even the board has expressed concerns about the ability of the market to absorb all of the units that are working their way through the approval and construction process.”
Developers, though, note the regional economy is on the upswing and that suburbs are a hot market again, according to several published reports. corners” residential
“So we should expect an increase in the number of people who are moving to the area, especially since we are the literal crossroads of Chester County,” Weller said.
Laurie Kerkering, president of the Exton Region Chamber of Commerce, said the increased activity is bound to be good for the chamber, which grew by 13 percent last year, and its members.
“I feel very good about it,” Kerkering said of the renewed activity in the township. “For a lot of years there wasn’t much going on. I think it’s positive for the region.”
The one concern that hovers over the rapid expansion is traffic – a concern that exists now before the new residences and business go online.
Gleason and Weller said the township has been addressing that issue in several ways.
It prepared and adopted a Transportation Capital Improvements Plan that estimated the traffic that would be generated by a development and what improvements to various intersections would be necessary in order to accommodate it.
That plan was developed with the assistance of a volunteer committee and a consultant, Traffic Planning & Design, in 2014 and 2015. Based on that, supervisors adopted the Transportation Impact Fee Ordinance in November 2015.
The ordinance allows West Whiteland to charge an impact fee on most new development based on the traffic it is anticipated to generate. The fee is $1,219.65 for each trip generated during the afternoon rush hour. The ordinance also allows the township to give credits toward the fee in exchange for work that a developer does to build the improvements the township wants.
“To date, we’ve received over $135,000 in fees and we have another $330,000 pending for plans that have been approved but are not yet under construction,” Weller wrote in an email.
As a result of the plan, developers are, or soon will be, constructing a new road linking Lincoln Highway and Waterloo Boulevard, as well as the interconnected traffic signals along King Road at the intersections with Dunwoody Drive and Phoenixville Pike.
“Those improvements would have cost the township over $1 million, if we had to pay for them,” Weller noted. “It cost the township $63,670 to create the plan ... and in less than two years we’ve gotten approximately $1.5 million in projects and fees.”
The other main effort West Whiteland is using to address traffic concerns is its Pottstown Pike Congestion Mitigation Feasibility Study. That plan will identify what options the township has for relieving the congestion along Route 100 between Boot Road and Commerce Drive
“We’re looking at whether it’s possible to fit in any more travel lanes, but also other things like intersection improvements, signal timing, and accommodations for pedestrians and bicyclists,” Weller said.
The $35,000 study, funded with the help of a $25,000 grant from the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, should be complete in the spring of 2018.