236-unit housing project nears OK
DOUGLASS (MONT.) >> A long-discussed housing development on 285 acres south of the former Zern’s Market in Gilbertsville is nearing the finish line.
The township supervisors voted unanimously on Feb. 5 to authorize Township Solicitor Robert Brant to draw up a resolution giving final approval to the project. That resolution will be the subject of a final vote, perhaps as soon as the next meeting on Feb. 19.
Known as “the Zern tract,” the Danny Jake Corp. has been proposing a development of one kind or another on the acreage between Jackson Road and Route 100 for six to eight years, said Township Manager Peter Hiryak.
It was more than a year ago that the supervisors granted the project preliminary site plan approval. At the time, it proposed 240 townhomes.
“It’s been through some changes since then,” said Jason Smeland, from the Chalfont firm of Lenape Valley Engineering, who presented the plan recommended by the township’s planning agency to the supervisors Monday night.
Smeland said once final approval is received, construction could begin in the spring and
will move forward in three phases, but may take several years to complete. “It depends on how well it sells,” he said.
The project is a key part of a long-planned proposal to build another road in Douglass parallel to Route 100 and Jackson Road. Called Market Street, the Zern tract project will contribute $329,293.02 toward the construction of the road, as well as some land easements for the construction, Smeland said.
Market Street and will not be constructed until a much larger commercial development along Route 100 and owned by the Gambone development family comes to pass.
As proposed now, that project includes two fourstory hotels of 100 rooms each; a 147,000 home improvement store, a 64,000 square-foot outpatient facility; another 100,000 square feet of retail and several smaller office buildings.
Hiryak, who said that project is “years away” from fruition, said the new Market Street will provide access to the Gambone project, as well as the Zern tract development, directly off Route 100.
He said in order to allow access to Route 100, complete with a traffic signal, PennDOT will require the Gambones to align Market Street with Bartman Avenue at the intersection with East Philadelphia Avenue, thus creating an safer intersection and requiring the demolishing of Doc Watson’s Irish Pub, which the Gambones own.
This article first appeared as a post in The Digital Notebook blog.