Town Center Project Once Again Takes Center Stage

As is so often the case these days at 2943 N. Charlotte St. when township officials get together to do the township's business, discussion turns to development issues -- the New Hanover Town Center in particular.

For the two people in town unaware of this project, the  Town Center is proposed on 209 acres bounded by Swamp Pike in the north, Route 663 in the east and Township Line Road to the west.

It was first proposed in 2015, under zoning created seemingly just for this project which remains controversial to this day, and received a preliminary approval in 2017.

The project calls for the construction of 779 dwelling units, some apartments, some townhouses and some single-family homes, along with 171,000 square feet of commercial space — at least as currently proposed.

They were in front of the supervisors last night for what had the potential to be a quick technical issue which, township solicitor Andrew Bellwoar suggested needed no action.

He said he interpreted the municipalities planning code, which governs development, to mean an April 22 deadline for a decision was meaningless because the project is now under review by the township's consultants.

Bellwoar also indicated that a meeting between the developer, staff and two supervisors had provided a framework to move forward.

But Marc Jonas, solicitor for the developer, had to have the last word and in what he said was an effort to be clear, proceeded to spark a conversation which turned argumentative and Jonas taking shots at Township Manager Jamie Gwynn.

Last month, Grynn reviewed for the supervisors all the ways in which the project has morphed over

The proposed New Hanover Town Center is located along

Route 73 to the north, Route 663 to the east and Township

Line Road to the west.

the years, the ups and downs of residential versus commercial, illustrating for the supervisors the maze that the township's consultants must navigate in trying to give a meaningful review.

"And this is where we start to go backwards," Jonas said as Gwynn began to push for the developer, R.P. Wynestone, to develop the project in accord with current, more stringent ordinances, instead of those in place in 2005 when the application was first made.

"Every time he starts to act like a lawyer, he sets us back," Jonas said, adding if Bellwoar continued to let Gwynn take this line of questioning "we're going to end up in litigation."

But at least two other township supervisors, Ross Snook and Kurt Zebrowski, said they too would like Wynestone to develop the property under current ordinances, something Jonas said would not happen.

"It's ridiculous," he said.

What's ridiculous, said resident Ben Lanyon, is building 779 new homes in a town already bursting at the seams with housing.

"Since I moved to this township, I have not spoken with a single person who thinks its a good idea to build 700-plus new houses here," Lanyon told the supervisors.

Supervisors Chairman Charles D. Garner Jr. did not disagree.

"Looking back 15 years, the supervisors at the time may have welcomed developers, did favors for developers and it was easy to get projects through," he said, adding, "and without that some of us might not live here."

"At some point, someone sitting up here must have thought it was a good idea to put a town in the middle of this township," said Garner. "And this is a big project and there are a lot of outstanding issues."

Garner said during a meeting between the developer, township staff and consultants and two supervisors, one of whom was him, he raised a number of those concerns, which he also shared Thursday night.

"The original plan had more commercial and office square footage, but the plan we have now has more residential. I think New Hanover has enough residential," Garner said. 

He also said be believes Township Line Road "should be totally improved and upgraded" and added that given the problems New Hanover continues to have with stormwater, that he hopes R.P. Wynestone will agree to apply the current stormwater ordinance to the plan."

He urged the township's traffic, planning and engineering consultants "to identify big issues, big picture items, and bring them to our attention."

As an example, Garner noted that rather than wait until the end of the process, that Montgomery County and PennDOT should be made aware now of the township's traffic concerns on Route 73 and Routes 663, which are county and state roads respectively, so they can be taken into account when its time for the developer to pull road permits.

In other matters, approved a new three-year contract for Gwynn, who announced that he, his wife and his baby girl are planning to move into the township. We'll have more on that once I get a copy of his new contract.

The supervisors also voted 3-2 to hire Alloy 5 to begin drawing up concept plans for new administrative and police township buildings.

And with that, click here to read the Tweets from last night's meeting.