Lansdale Borough Hall.
Townhouses, storage building up for approvals
A series of action items could secure approvals in the coming weeks for several projects in and around Lansdale.
Council’s code committee heard previews earlier this month about projects on Main Street, Seventh Street, Eighth Street, and Hancock Street, all in various stages of the approval process.
“315 West Main Street: they were in for a conditional use hearing back in 2020. This is the former PEAK Center building, that was converted — the second floor — to add apartments there,” said borough Director of Community Development Jason Van Dame.
The building located at 315 West Main was once known as Neiburg’s Clothing Store, started as an 1900s-era house before a series of conversions that ultimately resulted in the PEAK senior center locating there until 2012, according to the Lansdale Historical Society, then housed “The Attic” and the “Lansdale Music Factory” thrift store and concert venue in 2013-14, before staying empty for several years until a conversion into storefronts and apartments starting in 2020.
As part of the 2020 approvals, Van Dame told the code committee on April 4, the current occupants were required to limit the ground floor to two commercial uses. Currently, the Main Street side of the property is occupied by a salon, and the Madison Street side is partially occupied by El Limon restaurant, but with space for another.
“If you’ve been to El Limon, when you walk in, you realize half of that space is still vacant. So the owner of the building is asking to remove that restriction of two commercial uses, so that they can fill in the rest of the space in that building appropriately,” he said. The code committee had no objections to doing so, and a request to amend that conditional use approval could be on council’s action meeting agenda in their April 17 or May 15 meeting, according to Van Dame.
Seventh Street
Up for discussion at an upcoming borough zoning hearing board meeting will be a request from a property owner on the 500 block of East Seventh Street, for a second driveway entrance in and out of their property.
“That’s a property that is looking to put a second driveway entrance on his property, so he can put in a U-shaped driveway. He is getting older, and it’s getting more challenging to back out onto Seventh Street,” Van Dame said.
Borough codes currently require at least 100 feet between such entrances, and that property is 100 feet wide and would be unable to meet the requirement, thus the need for a variance from the zoning hearing board to do so, he said. Councilman Rich DiGregorio asked where specifically the property is located, and Van Dame said it’s between Line Street and Lansdale Avenue, and that the town’s codebook terminology for “front yards” may also come into play.
“It’s challenging language in our ordinance, because a front yard is all that yard between the street and the front line of your house. So we have very many properties in town that have parking in the front yard,” Van Dame said.
“His entire driveway is in his front yard. A lot of people’s driveways are in their front yard,” he said.
Eighth Street
Talks have begun at the borough’s planning commission about a project proposed for the 500 block of West Eighth Street, Van Dame told the committee. That property, currently used for storage of cargo trailers, could be the site of an additional storage building, “to store snow plows and other equipment that they sell,” he said.
No zoning issues have been identified with that application, and the planning commission had “positive comments” about the project in their initial talks, with a second round of discussion possible before that group, before the code committee and council could see and discuss it in May.
“We’ll see them back before the planning commission for a formal recommendation, and then they’ll be here for a request to approve the project,” he said.
Code committee chair Rafia Razzak asked about talks by the planning commission about that project connecting to the Liberty Bell Trail that runs through the town, and Van Dame said one design for that trail includes it running along the rear and front of the property before crossing Eighth Street.
“The request is that they leave an easement for a future trail, and they had no problem with doing that,” Van Dame said.
Hancock Street
Another project in the works, Van Dame told the committee, would go on the 300 block of East Hancock Street, where an applicant is seeking a use variance to build nine townhouses.
“They’re looking to redevelop a property that is just west of the train crossing at Hancock Street — there’s a property that had a fire about 16 months ago, and it used to be an apartment and a couple of boarding rooms in the property,” he said.
That property is currently zoned industrial, so despite the earlier residential use prior to that fire, and similar residential uses surrounding the site, the applicant would need a use variance to add new residential there, the code director told the committee. Resident Nancy Frei asked how the tenants of those townhouses would enter and exit onto Hancock, and Van Dame said specifics would be presented during the April and/or May zoning hearings, and if the use variance is granted, they’d need to come back for plan approval afterward.
“The driveway, it’s pretty much where it is currently, so one exit onto Hancock is what’s proposed,” he said.
Razzak added that she had also seen earlier versions of that project at the planning commission, and Van Dame said that applicant and their engineer had originally discussed “about ten” different options for that site, before using feedback from the planning commission to narrow it down to the one up for approvals now.
“I think they knew which one would probably be the most likely to be approved, and that ended up as what they’re now looking to move through,” he said.
Lansdale’s borough council next meets at 7 p.m. on April 17, its code committee next meets at 7:30 p.m. on May 1, the zoning hearing board next meets at 7 p.m. on April 16 and May 21, and the planning commission next meets at 7:30 p.m. on May 20, all at the borough municipal building, 1 Vine Street. For more information visit www.Lansdale.org.
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