A trailer truck heads westbound on Sumneytown Pike toward North Penn High School, past where sidewalks end at a driveway to the adjacent Calvary Baptist church and school, where new sidewalks could be added and/or Sumneytown widened, as seen on Wednesday, April 16, 2025. Photo by Dan Sokil | The Reporter.
County report called for road widening, bike lanes and sidewalks
An intersection near North Penn High School is getting a closer look.
School board members voted last week to authorize a traffic study looking at the possible widening of Sumneytown Pike near Valley Forge Road.
“We are looking to defer building of that sidewalk and some of the curbing until that road is widened, but we’re going to study it to make sure,” said Superintendent Todd Bauer.
Over the past several years, school board members and district staff have developed plans for renovations to North Penn High School, with a first phase slated to start this summer and work throughout the school slated to run into the 2030s.
As part of that process, a traffic study looking at possible road improvements around the site was presented in early 2023, the same year Towamencin Township saw results of a sidewalk study showing new connections running along and through that campus.
In late 2024 the district’s design team told Towamencin officials that their latest plans included a new sidewalk along Sumneytown Pike, and that widening of the intersection of Sumneytown and Valley Forge Road was on long-term county plans, and in January district staff said the township had asked for further study of Sumneytown at Bridle Path Drive and whether a pedestrian crossing could be added there.
The county’s “Montco 2040” comprehensive plan adopted in 2021 includes a listing for “Sumneytown Pike: corridor and intersection improvements from PA 63 (Forty Foot Road) to PA 363 (Valley Forge Road),” and a 2022 “Montco Pikes” report by the county planning commission takes a detailed look at Sumneytown, calling for widening to add a center turn lane, an additional travel lane in each direction, and bike lanes and sidewalks between Forty Foot Road in Towamencin and Broad Street in Upper Gwynedd, including along the high school site.
That report also spells out several issues at the intersection of Sumneytown and Valley Forge, including a lack of sidewalks on the northwest side of the intersection, a lack of drainage on the east side, and no pedestrian connection to the North Penn Marketplace shopping center on the southeast side of the intersection.
A page in the 2022 “Montco Pikes” report by the Montgomery County Planning Commission examines Sumneytown Pike and needed upgrades between Forty Foot Road in Towamencin, at left, and Broad Street in Upper Gwynedd at right. (Image courtesy of Montgomery County Planning Commission)During the school board meeting on April 8, Bauer outlined the latest request from the township, proposing a “survey report for pedestrian, roadway, and roadway widening impact” be done, examining that area. In a letter provided by consulting firm Horner and Canter Associates to the district, the firm proposes working with Montgomery County officials on a highway occupancy permit plan “related to the proposed sidewalk adjacent to the existing culvert end wall” on Sumneytown, and the superintendent gave specifics on where they’ll study.
“For those who know the property well, as you move towards Valley Forge Road, on the left hand of Sumneytown Pike gets very steep, and there’s a water feature down there, and what that could all look like,” Bauer said.
A page in the 2022 “Montco Pikes” report by the Montgomery County Planning Commission calls for widening of Sumneytown Pike between Forty Foot Road in Towamencin and Broad Street in Upper Gwynedd. (Image courtesy of Montgomery County Planning Commission)Board members approved that contract unanimously, and Bauer said it included a not-to-exceed cost of $4,000. No updates on the high school renovations were given in March since the school board’s facilities and operations committee meeting was cancelled, but in February district staff and the project construction team said the first phase of indoor renovations is slated to start in late May, outdoor site work will start in summer, and work on the school’s K-pod will be done throughout the upcoming schoolyear, with the second phase likely to be bid out in May, contracts awarded in late summer, and current forecasts call for work to run into 2031.
North Penn’s school board next meets at 7 p.m. on April 14 and the facilities and operations committee next meets at 7 p.m. on April 28; for more information, visit www.NPenn.org.
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