On February 26th, MoreThanTheCurve.com reported on a zoning application that involved a gas station for the property at 625 West Ridge Pike in Conshohocken (Plymouth Township). The application is up for review before the township’s planning agency on March 4th.
The planning commission will review the application and consider whether to make a recommendation to the township’s zoning hearing board on whether it should grant the zoning relief. Since the initial article, a public notice has been advertised for the application for the township’s zoning hearing board, which has a hearing scheduled for March 16th. This document provides more details on the specific zoning relief sought (which we promised to provide an update on once available).
This property is the Conshohocken-Ridge Corporate Center that is on the corner of Ridge Pike and Colwell Lane and has several office buildings. Over the past two years, the property owner, BET Investments, gave informal presentations on redeveloping a significant portion of the site with a mixed use building that would include a grocery store, a couple of other retail spaces, and apartments.
During that process, Plymouth’s council members asked BET to consider other uses for the property, that were permissible by the current zoning. The grocery store/apartment building would have required a zoning amendment or zoning relief for those uses.
While this application is seeking zoning relief, it isn’t to the level of a major residential apartment complex. For the gasoline sales, that is allowed if a special exception is granted. This has been granted previously for the Royal Farms that is under construction on Ridge Pike, and the proposed gas station would be neighbors to a Lukoil. The variances involve signage.
Details on which brand of gasoline/retail store would be involved have not been made public.
Below is this text of the notice:
On an application for Special Exceptions from Plymouth Township Zoning Ordinance No. 342, as amended, Article X, Section 1000.k.1, Article XVI, Section 1601.C(3)(b) and Variances from Article XVI, Section 1601.C(2) and Article XX1, Section 2108. The Special Exception requested is as follows: To permit a gasoline filing station (8 multi-product fuel dispensing facilities) in conjunction with the retail store and to permit two or more businesses on the property, by allowing one square foot of sign area for each foot of street frontage in excess of 100 feet, a total sign area on the property of 195 square feet. The Variances requested are as follows: To permit two or more businesses on the property to each have more than one sign exceeding 40 square feet on a street frontage, and to permit a total sign area at the property of 685.45 square feet, rather than the maximum permitted total sign area of 120 square feet, or 195 square feet if special exception is granted. And to permit applicant two years from the date of the zoning decision and order to obtain a building permit. The property is located at 625 West Ridge Pike, Conshohocken, PA 19428 in “Commercial” Zoning District.. STEVE AND TUSGA WARD: On an application for Variance from Plymouth Township Zoning Ordinance No. 342, as amended, Article XIX, Section 1908.1. The Variance requested is as follows: Adding a 16 x 24 shed with 10′ walls up against existing south fence. The property is located at 2905 Jolly Road in “B” Residential Zoning District. Any citizen of Plymouth Township or interested party may attend the public hearing and have an opportunity to be heard. PLYMOUTH TOWNSHIP ZONING HEARING BOARD Joel Rowe, Zoning Officer NTH Feb 27, March 6; 1a
The planning commission meeting is scheduled for March 4th at 7:00 p.m. The zoning hearing board meeting is scheduled for March 16 at 7:00 p.m. Both meetings will be held at the township building.
Disclosure – BET Investments is an advertiser with Burb Media, the parent company of MoreThanTheCurve.com
Photo – Google