The now-vacant former SKF Inc. building can be seen behind a Wells Fargo bank branch adjacent to a near-vacant shopping center on Forty Foot Road in Towamencin on Wednesday, June 4, 2025. Photo by Dan Sokil | The Reporter.
Latest plans could lift age restrictions on apartments behind long-discussed shopping center
Another round of approvals could be coming soon for a pair of long-discussed projects along Forty Foot Road in Towamencin.
Developer PSDC gave the board an update in mid-May on two projects in the works, including a code change for their planned apartments near Forty Foot and Allentown Road.
“We’re proposing to submit an application for a text amendment to the ELO overlay district, to allow market-rate apartments in the residential sector of the ELO district along Forty Foot Road,” said attorney Ed Hughes on behalf of PSDC.
“The apartments will be similar to the apartments built near the Marriott — they’ll be market rate apartments, without an age restriction,” he said.
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 residential apartments behind the shopping center, and in 2022 the developer said they had seen little interest from the market for age-restricted housing.
“In the last five or six years, no one’s come forward with a proposal to develop age-restricted housing in the residential sector, so I think we want to shift over to market rate apartments. And we will be submitting a text amendment in order to do that,” Hughes said.
In addition to that application, PSDC also plans to submit applications for conditional use approval for two pad sites along Forty Foot Road, the attorney told the board. Earlier plans had referenced a breakfast restaurant and/or a bank on pad sites in the complex, near a new traffic signal at a planned driveway on Forty Foot at Newbury Way.
Rendering showing a new Whole Foods supermarket and new Target store to be built in and behind the former Towamencin Village Shopping Center. (Credit: The Reporter/Image via Loopnet.com listing)Supervisors Chairwoman Joyce Snyder asked for specifics on where the apartments would be located, and Hughes said the apartments would likely be behind the pad sites and between the now-vacant SKF building and the shopping center.
“The SKF building is vacant, as you know, and we’ve lost the anchor tenants for the shopping center, and no market for the age restricted, so we’re going to shift over to attempt to have approval for market-rate apartments,” Hughes said.
Supervisor Amer Barghouth asked how many apartments would be on the plan, and Hughes said the application would apply for 226, with heights likely no higher than the SKF building. As for the center itself, Hughes said the developer is still trying to develop the pad sites, and engineer John Alejnikov added that the pad site plans would likely be filed by the end of May: “those pad sites along Forty Foot Road, we’re actively working on.”
Workers carry equipment into a future Chipotle building on Forty Foot Road in Towamencin on Wednesday, June 4, 2025.Both added they had no additional info about the grocery store or the Chipotle and Mattress Warehouse pad sites. During a visit by The Reporter this week, staff at the Mattress Warehouse said that store had opened May 1 to strong support from the community and frequent questions about the Chipotle and surrounding sites; crews working at the Chipotle said it would be open “soon” but declined further comment.
Farther south on Forty Foot, the developer has also promised a new “Main Street” development around the intersection of Forty Foot and Sumneytown Pike, which could include new apartments behind several vacant office buildings now owned or under agreement by the developer.
Alejnikov and attorney Matt McHugh also gave an update on the plans for Forty Foot and Sumneytown Pike, saying the latest version of those plans was vetted by the township’s planning commission in early May, and includes changes from earlier versions.
Towamencin’s supervisors meet at 7 p.m. on June 11 and 25 and the township planning commission next meets at 7 p.m. on July 7, all at the township administration building, 1090 Troxel Road. For more information visit www.Towamencin.org.
This article appears courtesy of a content share agreement between North Penn Now and The Reporter. To read more stories like this, visit https://www.thereporteronline.com
