New sign could go near Newbury Way traffic signal
Plans for a new sign near a long-vacant shopping center in Towamencin are moving ahead, while the center itself may have new news soon.
Township officials voted ahead a request for a hearing on that new sign last week, at the request of developer PSDC.
“If we don’t get the extension request, we run the risk of a deemed approval. If the board doesn’t timely act, the law treats it as if you approved the proposal,” said township solicitor Bob Iannozzi.
At Forty Foot and Allentown Roads, PSDC has proposed plans to revive the former Towamencin Village Shopping Center since the early 2010s, with an entertainment lifestyle overlay district approved in 2016 amid promises of new tenants that at times have included Whole Foods inside a former grocery space, a new Target behind the center, new tenants including Harbor Freight, and a new building housing a Chipotle restaurant and Mattress Warehouse shop on a pad site adjacent to the center.
An earlier version of those plans, shown in 2018, included age-restricted apartments behind the shopping center, and in 2022, the developer said they had seen little interest from the market for age-restricted housing, thus a request this June for a new plan for apartments with no age restriction. In August, the developer sought further permission to build on four pad sites between Forty Foot and an office building formerly used by SKF Inc., remove aboveground stormwater basins and add underwater retention, and build a long-discussed driveway and signal on Forty Foot at Newbury Way, while residents called the shopping center a “ghost town” and pressed for action soon.
First, the shopping center itself: an update on that project was listed on the board’s agenda for Dec. 10, but tabled at the request of developer Mark Nicoletti due to possible new developments, Township Manager David Kraynik told the board.
“We were advised earlier today, and I shared this with the board, that Mr. Nicoletti was not able to be here tonight. There is some news that he wants to share with us, but it has not been confirmed yet,” Kraynik said. “We’ll certainly invite him sometime in January.”
After that update, attorney Ed Hughes made the case on behalf of PSDC that the board grant a conditional use request to allow a second freestanding monument sign along Forty Foot Road, to advertise the pad sites between Forty Foot and the shopping center.
“The issues are: The code says you can’t have more than two monument signs on a property. We already have two signs approved: one on Allentown Road and one on Forty Foot Road,” Hughes said.
“We want to put a third sign at the intersection of (Forty Foot and) Newbury Way, next to the pad sites, next to the SKF building,” he said, and Board Chairwoman Joyce Snyder called it “the infamous intersection where we can’t seem to get anything going,” which the attorney confirmed.
That new sign would be roughly 556 feet away from the existing sign on that side of the site, Hughes told the board, and the exact content of the sign hasn’t been finalized, but a conditional use hearing would need to be advertised and held before plans for the sign design are finalized.
“We have a red light (at Newbury), and an intersection going into the shopping center. It would facilitate the improvement of the shopping center, give people the idea to come in there at the red light, and the new pad sites,” he said.
Snyder asked if the new sign would advertise only the pad sites or also businesses in the center itself, and Hughes said that would likely not be determined until tenants were finalized: “I don’t think it would be identical — the anchors, the larger tenants, might be on each sign, but there’s only so much on each,” he said.
Depending on how the distances are measured, the development could also need relief from the township for the new sign, the attorney added, and details of those distance calculations could be presented in a formal conditional use hearing. Supervisor Kristin Warner said she’d like to see details of those calculations, and Hughes said that would be part of the formal record for the hearing, while showing a site plan with the distances between the signs and driveways outlined.
Snyder then asked for a motion from the board to advertise the conditional use hearing, saying she was “comfortable with the hearing, I’m not comfortable approving” the sign. Supervisor Chuck Wilson noted that the new sign would be across Forty Foot from a neighborhood on Newbury with residents who would likely oppose any light pollution from a new sign.
“They have privacy fences in that area, but they’re low. This light’s just going to come right over the top of them. I just know the residents are concerned about it, their property values and the light pollution,” Wilson said.
Warner then asked if the developer could consider a compromise, with a sign partway down the frontage between the Newbury driveway and Allentown. Hughes said the developer would prefer it be nearer the entrance, and Snyder said safety could be a factor.
“I don’t really want people trying to read the sign as they’re whizzing by at 45 miles an hour. I agree that it makes sense to have it at a red light,” Snyder said.
Supervisor Kofi Osei then made a motion to advertise a conditional use hearing at an upcoming meeting, and Hughes said the developer would proceed with securing review letters from township and county planners. Warner asked if the board had any option to delay or defer a decision, and Iannozzi said the developer could seek a delay or extension if wanted, but if the board does not act, then the request could be considered approved.
“You want to get this properly advertised, and before you in the appropriate way,” Iannozzi said.
Warner then joked that she seconded the request for the hearing “under duress,” and Osei said he looked forward to “the residents there hav(ing) a chance to speak on this.”
One public comment on the request was then made by resident Barry Kenyon, who said he’d seen several versions of plans and promises from Nicoletti and PSDC to redevelop the shopping center, including at Newbury, “where there’s an apron for a road, but not really a road going in,” yet little action.
“They haven’t built anything there, so how do they know what’s going onto the sign? Are they advertising the things on that road, which is currently just an apron? With the performance of that shopping center, are we looking 15, 20 years from now?”
“This is ridiculous. Nicoletti has been stringing this township along for what, 30 years? I would like to see it before I’m dead,” he said, and Snyder replied, “I 100 percent hear you.”
The board then voted 3-2 to authorize staff to advertise the conditional use hearing at a future meeting, with Wilson and supervisor Amer Barghouth voting against.
Towamencin’s supervisors next meet at 6:45 p.m. on Jan. 5, 2026. For more information, visit www.Towamencin.org
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