Upper Gwynedd zoning hearing on North Penn bus site postponed

A hearing slated for this week on a new site for North Penn’s bus garage has been postponed.

Upper Gwynedd Township announced Monday that a much-discussed zoning hearing on the district’s new transportation center on Church Road will not be on the agenda for the April 24 zoning hearing board meeting.

“UPDATE: Please be advised that the applicant for Hearing No. 24-07: Summit/ELU Church Road, LLC located at 203 Church has requested a continuance until May 28th,” said the township in an email alert and online notice posted Monday afternoon.

203 Church Road has been discussed publicly, but not in detail, in recent weeks, as district officials have honed in on a new site for the district’s transportation needs. Throughout 2023 district officials made the case for renovations to North Penn High School, and as part of that process have said that the current district transportation center — a bus maintenance garage, dispatch office, propane tank and fuel station, and parking for roughly 120 district-owned buses — located between the high school and Crawford Stadium would need to be moved offsite, to free up that space for modular classrooms or a new wing, and construction staging.

In late February, district administrators said they were in talks with a real estate broker about one particular site, and in early March, Upper Gwynedd’s board heard that the district was interested in 203 Church Road, located just south of Wissahickon Avenue, a former warehouse and office site formerly owned by aircraft component manufacturer Triumph Controls which is still located next door at 205 Church.

In late March the district and township heard questions from residents asking if the traffic and road impact of the site had been studied, and who would pay for any needed road upgrades to handle the increased traffic, while the township said the district would need permission from Upper Gwynedd’s zoning hearing board to allow the transportation center use on that site. In early April the township commissioners voted to seek quotes for a ‘conflict counsel’ to represent the township during those proceedings, due to a possible conflict with their solicitor, and at that time said township staff would attend the April 24 hearing on the bus site.

Now, that discussion will wait a month, per the township notice Monday that the North Penn item has been postponed until May 28, after an earlier version of that agenda had the North Penn item included. According to meeting materials posted by the township, the 13.7-acre property is listed as “Equitable owner, under agreement of sale,” and a sketch plan included in the meeting documents shows the current former Triumph office building would remain, a fuel station would be added just south of the building, the current parking lots between the building and Church Road would be reconfigured to add green space and modify the driveway leading to Church, and new roughly 220 new parking spaces atop underground stormwater storage would be added behind the current Triumph building.

District officials said Monday the project would be on the agenda for the school board’s facilities and operations committee when that group next meets at a new date and time: 6 p.m. on May 6 online, instead of the previously advertised meeting date on April 29.   

North Penn’s school board next meets at 7 p.m. on May 7 at the district Educational Services center, 401 E. Hancock Street in Lansdale, and Upper Gwynedd’s commissioners next meet at 7 p.m. on May 6 and the township’s zoning hearing board next meets at 7 p.m. on April 24 and May 28, all at the township administration building, 1 Parkside Place.

For more information visit www.UpperGwynedd.org or www.NPenn.org respectively.

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