RADNOR In the heart of the Main Line, a Blue Route nexus and
home to universities and colleges, Radnor Township is one of the region's most desirable
locations.
Two development proposals - involving Villanova University
and the former Wyeth property - have many township residents worrying whether
Radnor could be paying a price for its attributes, whether the township was
approaching a breaking point.
In recent months, they have been packing township meetings
to express their anxieties.
"We all moved here to have a suburban lifestyle,"
said Tish Long, a resident who started the group Friends to Preserve Radnor.
Being so close to each other, she said, the proposed projects are "going
to create a very urban landscape that many of us don't want."
BioMed Realty hopes to build 320 apartments, a hotel, retail
space, and offices across from Radnor High School, on the former Wyeth
property, near the intersection of Lancaster Avenue, which is Route 30, and the
Blue Route, I-476. Not far to the east on Lancaster Avenue, Villanova
University has proposed building dormitories, a performing-arts center, a
parking garage, and a campus bookstore on an existing parking lot.
Traffic in that area is "kind of a nightmare right
now," said Long. She and her neighbors have spent nearly $25,000 in the
last two years to fight Villanova's proposal.
The Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission has
predicted that, in the next two decades, traffic would increase about 6 percent
and that already-long red-light wait times would get longer.
And a commission study didn't take into account the Wyeth
project.
The study found that nearly 10,000 pedestrians cross two
intersections near the campus every day. During peak-commuting hours, some
drivers can wait more than two minutes for a light to change.
Villanova's plans include a pedestrian bridge over Lancaster
Avenue, and special zoning for BioMed's site would include traffic changes -
among them widening King of Prussia Road to four lanes - paid for by the
developers.
The Villanova plan would improve wait times, said the
planning commission's Keith Hartington, who conceded that the overall impact
was hard to assess.
"I can't just look in my crystal ball and say things
aren't going to be as bad as you think," Hartington said, "but it
depends what improvements are done and to what extent they're done."
Chris Kovolski, assistant to the president at Villanova,
suggested that the project might even reduce traffic. The dormitories would
house nearly 1,200 students who now live off campus and drive to school.
"Traffic is an important concern in this area," he
said. "There's no doubt about that."
The planning commission study did not address what effects
the BioMed proposal would have on King of Prussia Road, which has an estimated
daily traffic volume of 5,000 vehicles and where traffic is a major concern for
some residents.
The property is "probably the best site in all of
suburban Philadelphia," said Matt McDevitt, the company's executive vice
president.
As a possible alternative to the mixed-use plan, BioMed has
proposed developing the site with the existing zone, with office-space only,
and with no infrastructure improvements.
"Well, that would be a disaster," said
Commissioner William Spingler, who said he hoped the mixed-use plan would
proceed.
But Commissioner Richard Booker said the plans were too
large for the site and would "flood the roads" with traffic. "It
would be too hard on the infrastructure that we have there."
McDevitt pointed out that BioMed's mixed-use plan would
generate traffic at different times, rather than exclusively at peak-commuting
periods.
In addition to adding two lanes to King of Prussia Road,
BioMed has offered to add turning lanes.
"So the trick," said Elaine Schaefer, president of
the board of commissioners, "is to incentivize them to do a mixed-use and
to take on the traffic responsibilities by giving them a little bit more
density. But that's the rub: How much density could we withstand and not have a
negative impact on traffic?"
That question won't be answered quickly. The commissioners
will next discuss the BioMed project April 14, and they are unlikely to vote on
the plan at that meeting, Schaefer said.
Some residents of Radnor, the fourth-largest municipality in
Delaware County, with a population of 31,500, remain skeptical of traffic
studies and promises from developers. At meetings, they have urged both
Villanova and BioMed to scale down their projects.
The assertion that BioMed could mitigate traffic
"doesn't pass a sniff test," said resident Bob Pietrobono, adding
that he waits in long traffic delays every day on King of Prussia Road. In the
last several weeks, Pietrobono and his neighbors began talking to members of
the Friends to Preserve Radnor group, and they have formed an alliance called
One Radnor.
The group's plan is for the township to hire an outside
planner - rather than the township's planning board - to review both
development proposals, as well as the township's comprehensive plan.
Commissioners will consider that request at a meeting
Monday, when they are scheduled to discuss the Villanova proposal. Schaefer and
other commissioners said they were in no rush to resolve any of the development
issues.
"You're never going to have change that pleases
everyone," she said, "so you let it develop until you have a product
or an ordinance or a policy that achieves your goal as well as you possibly
can, and you move forward."
BY THE NUMBERS
320 apartments to be built in the BioMed project at Route 30
and I-476.
1,200 students, who now live off campus and drive to school,
would be housed at Villanova's new dormitories.
$25,000 has been spent by neighbors over the last two years
to fight Villanova's proposal.
10,000 pedestrians cross two intersections near the
Villanova campus every day.
120 seconds of wait time for vehicles at some intersections
along Route 30 near the Villanova campus during peak hours.
Source: Philly.com
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