Lansdale votes ahead plans for Hancock Street townhouses

A new project is in the works that could bring a new neighborhood to a long-discussed parcel on Hancock Street.

Council’s Code committee saw a preview earlier this month of plans for a new nine-unit neighborhood on the 300 block of Hancock Street.

“It’s in an industrial zoning district, you can see it’s a smaller property, industrial-type uses don’t really fit. 30 years ago, this was a great place for industrial, but the area’s kind of changed around it,” said engineer Jason Smeland.

Up for discussion is a parcel of roughly 33,500 square feet, just west of the rail crossing on Hancock where a former apartment building with boarding rooms within was damaged by fire two years ago.

Smeland and property owner Jason Thomas presented to the code committee their proposal for an un-lotted development that does comply to impervious coverage and setback requirements spelled out in borough code, but would be a residential use on a property that’s currently zoned industrial.

“We needed to go get the use variance to allow it, and we were successful with the zoning hearing board,” Smeland said.

    Engineer Jason Smeland holds a plan depicting a proposed complex of nine townhouses at 380 Hancock Street in Lansdale during council’s code committee meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024.
 By Dan Sokil | The Reporter   

As that approval was secured, the engineer told the committee, the borough's planning commission helped refine the design: a roughly L-shaped alley would run between five townhouses with front porches fronting on Hancock and four more to the rear of the site that front on the alley, with garage and driveway parking spaces for each unit. The townhouses would be 20 to 22 feet wide, "similar to what Andale Green did," Smeland said, and the alley would be roughly 24 feet wide, larger than the 12 to 16 feet required by code.

"Probably the biggest issue with this project was the access, and how close we are to the railroad, and the traffic on Hancock. There was really only one place you could have the entrance," Smeland said, pointing to that entrance on the plan.

"We looked at doing some sort of loop configuration, but that would bring your driveway too close to the railroad and be unsafe, so we pushed it all the way over" to the west side of the property, and added width to allow multiple vehicles to pass.

All review comments from borough staff and their fire marshal will be complied with or addressed, the engineer added, and the developer has been in contact with the North Penn Water Authority about the best way to connect to existing underground utility lines there. Councilman Rich DiGregorio asked if the electric and internet lines would be above or below ground, and Smeland said below, with connections likely on the side of the site nearest the rail line. 

    (Credit: The Reporter)
  

Committee chair Rafia Razzak asked if the engineer could address an issue raised by the town's planning commission, about the location of a North Penn school district bus stop on Hancock Street. Thomas said the nearest current stop is at the entrance to Stony Creek Park just west of their proposed driveway, and the developer would work with the school district to identify the best site to pick up kids.

"Most of the Andale residents, the children from Andale Green stand on the Andale side, so I suppose our residents could stand on the Stony Creek side," he said.

Each house would be roughly 2,000 to 2,200 square feet, Thomas added, with three floors and two-and-a-half to three bathrooms, which Smeland called "very similar to Andale." The exiting trees on the property would mostly be replanted, but a net total of five trees would be removed, and the developer would pay a fee in lieu of replacing those, the engineer said.

According to borough Director of Community Development Jason Van Dame, the project has been vetted by the borough's planning commission, which has granted preliminary and final land development approval, thus the request for council to do the same. Code committee member Mike Yetter than made a motion to advance the proposal to full council for both preliminary and final land development approval, subject to adding "appropriate lighting for the alleyway," and the rest of the code committee approved doing so.

Lansdale’s borough council next meets at 7 p.m. on Nov. 20 and its code committee next meets at 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 4, both at the borough municipal building, 1 Vine Street. For more information visit www.Lansdale.org.

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