Planners to pursue regional traffic study
Multiple housing projects spur fears of gridlock
POTTSTOWN >> The specter of traffic gridlock loomed over a regional planning discussion of the proposed Town Center project in New Hanover Thursday and drove a decision to pursue a regional traffic study to better understand the cumulative impact of housing developments in the region.
The meeting of the Pottstown Metropolitan Area Regional Planning Committee was unusual in that both Phil Agliano, chairman of the New Hanover Township Board of Supervisors and Anthony Kuklinski, his counterpart in neighboring Douglass (Mont.) Township were there.
And they were joined by officials from five other municipalities in being focused on the particulars of the more than 750 homes proposed for the Town Center project and what it could mean for traffic on Route 73, Route 663, East Philadelphia Avenue, Moyer Road and ultimately, Route 100 and Route 422.
The project is located on 209 acres along Swamp Pike, Route 663 and Township Line Road where the former New Hanover Airport was located.
Plans call for 761 dwelling units of which six are to be single family; 74 are twins; 162 are multiplex; 218 are townhouses; 199 are “village house units; 14 are
multi-family located over commercial office space and 88 are “atrium house units.”
Additionally, a commercial portion of the project located on 28.6 acres is to include a grocery store, three restaurants, three office buildings and retail “flex space,” according to the overview provided by the Montgomery County Planning commission.
It could take 10 years or more before the project is entirely finished, although Agliano said developers insist they will break ground on the first of five phases — 175 homes — in 2017, this despite not having planning or supervisor approval yet.
Agliano also said the supervisors intend to insist that the commercial elements be the second phase of the plan. “We don’t want them to just build houses,” he said.
Kuklinski said the project could add 7,500 additional trips to the region’s roads, much of which “would be funneled into the two lanes of East Philadelphia Avenue through Gilbertsville” to connect with Route 100.
But as large and as much of an impact as this project has the potential to create, there’s more.
“This is not the only 1,000-pound gorilla in the room,” Kuklinski said.
Ultimately adding to the region’s traffic is the long-proposed development of what is called “the Zern tract,” 240 townhomes on 28.5 acres in Gilbertsville along Route 100 and the accompanying construction of a new road, Market Street, which the regional planners reviewed in October.
Add this to the proposal for a Turkey Hill store near Bermont Motors, at the intersection of Gilbertsville Road, Big Road and Swamp Pike and that intersection becomes particularly difficult, said Douglass planner Josh Stouch. And there’s even more. Agliano said New Hanover’s 170-home Kingston Hill development is finishing up, along with the 380-unit Windlestrae development. But coming on-line are two more housing projects, one for 150 homes at the intersection of Moyer Road and Route 663 and another 150 units near the intersection of Buchert and Romig roads.
Tom Troutman, a representative from Lower Pottsgrove, noted that the 175home Spring Valley project is about ready to start construction off Pleasantview Road and “there is a ‘For Sale’ sign at Ringing Hill Orchards. That’s zoned R-2,” he said.
With all these projects adding all those vehicles to the area’s roads, it will have an impact beyond just the town where the homes are located, the planners observed.
“People driving through Gilbertsville to get to Route 100 don’t just live in Douglass Township,” said John Cover, community planning section chief for the Montgomery County Planning Commission. “And it would be impractical and cost-prohibitive to say that Douglass Township has to pay to fix that.”
At the same time “you don’t want to just pile on New Hanover, we’ve all got a stake in this,” says Cover. “Work together as a group, make it a lot better. This is a regional problem with regional impacts. You all drive on the same roads.”
Further, said Troutman, “all that traffic is ultimately headed for Route 100 and Route 422.”
“We have two intersections on Route 422 in our township, Armand Hammer Boulevard and Sanatoga and if you go down there at 5 O’clock on any given day, you can watch the traffic just sit there and back up,” he said.
Add to that, the traffic that will be added by the more than 500 homes planned at Sanatoga Green off Evergreen Road and the traffic outlook only darkens, Troutman said.
Part of the problem, said Upper Pottsgrove Township Commissioners Chairman Elwood Taylor, is that current state laws — Act 209 — only allow individual townships to assess developers costs for road improvements in their specific townships and only within seven miles of a particular project after a study has been done.
“We don’t have any leverage beyond that,” he said.
“Yes, until now, it has always been every municipality for itself,” Cover conceded.
However, a regional traffic study might help make the case for more leverage, said Cover.
“You speak with a very large voice when you speak as one entity,” he said.
He noted that the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission sets aside $60,000 each year for the Pottstown region and that money could be used to implement a regional traffic study that could be completed in as little as six months.
“Most of the data is already there,” he said, noting that individual projects are often required to implement their own, specific traffic studies.
The planners immediately voted unanimously to direct the county to take steps to contact DVRPC and investigate making the regional traffic study happen in 2017.
Cover said the eight municipalities which comprise the regional planning committee should also begin to seriously examine ways to encourage employers to locate locally, meaning fewer cars commuting long distances.
Long a theme for Pottstown Borough Council President Dan Weand, he said “I would like to implement a survey of Route 422 commuters and ask them to ask their employers if they would re-consider locating here. They would have more productive employees who aren’t spending two hours on the road every morning.”
However, “we have property that is zoned for commercial or industrial right now and it’s not selling,” said Taylor.
Work on that subject should begin, said Taylor, with the market study the regional planners completed in 2012 and which is supposed to serve as a market-driven rationale for zoning changes meant to attract businesses for which the market study has shown there is a need.
“How do we effectuate that?” he asked.
“Well it sounds like we’ve just set our agenda for 2017,” Cover replied.