Borough sets new guideline for old high school property
SOUDERTON » If you still think 140 is the maximum number of characters in a tweet, you’re old school.
But if you think 140 is the maximum number of homes that can be built in the Souderton portion of the former Souderton Area High School property, you’re up to date.
A motion unanimously passed by Souderton Borough Council at its June 4 meeting authorizes the Souderton Borough Planning Commission to consider a plan including a maximum of 140 new homes on the property.
The overall plans for the site are for a mix of residential and commercial uses in the block between North School Lane, East Chestnut Street, County Line Road and East Broad Street (Route 113), but the only things built or in the process of being built thus far are 72 townhouses.
The up to 140 homes in the new plan would consist of the existing 24 townhouses in the former school parking lot at School Lane and East Broad Street; a maximum of 88 more townhouses, with 52 of those along North School Lane and 36 along East Chestnut Street; and a maximum of 28 homes in Walden model mixed-use buildings, the motion said.
Walden models are townhouses built on top of commercial space, developer Clay Heckler told the council earlier this year.
The new proposal comes following discussion with Heckler at a May council work session.
Other parameters put in the new motion include having the driveway and
highest visibility of a town center plaza-type area oriented to East Broad Street and planning for reduced size garages or no garage for some of the Walden homes. The garages would
be on the first floor, so by reducing the size of or eliminating the garage, more room is left for commercial space on the first floor. Another part of the motion encouraged using a sketch
plan created by the Montgomery County Planning Commission for the placement of more commercial/ retail buildings on the site.
The June 4 vote does not give approval to the plans,
but it allows the planning process to move forward and for the planning commission to continue reviewing the plans, council President Brian Goshow said.
“The real issue that we have is we have a zoning ordinance where some of this is in conflict with,” Borough Manager Mike Coll said of the new proposal.
As the plans move forward, the zoning ordinance will need to be amended, he said, but the planning commission has to review the plans under the existing rules unless council says otherwise.
“We’re sort of in a pickle in that there seems to be a desire to move in one direction, but the planning commission does not really have the direction to allow that movement to occur,” Coll said. “The intent here is to sort of allow that progression.”
Both the Souderton Borough and Montgomery County planning commis-
sions can then continue their reviews and the developer can begin work on more detailed engineering plans, he said.
“Hopefully, we’ll get to a point where we’re comfortable with what we’re seeing and then we can start drafting whatever amendment to our zoning ordinance we need to do to make that plan happen,” Coll said, “but there still is a lot of work yet ahead.”
Any proposed zoning changes will follow the standard process including a public hearing before a vote, Goshow said.
The borough initially made a requirement that no more than half the square footage of floor space in the development could go for residential use but has faced arguments that it is not financially feasible to develop the site with half of the space going for commercial use.