SANATOGA PA – The more than 400 acres that will be included in the joint Lower Pottsgrove-Limerick (PA) townships’ master plan for the Sanatoga interchange at U.S. Route 422 must be officially mapped in detail, and Lower Pottsgrove’s Board of Commissioners last week agreed to pay $10,000 as its share of the cost to have the work done.
The Sanatoga interchange at U.S. Route 422.
The mapping will be undertaken by Simone Collins, the Berwyn PA-based consultant both townships are relying upon to create a unified plan for what is known as the Interchange District. The firm will make zoning recommendations, suggest publicly and privately funded improvements, set standards for new roads and street scape design, and guide the district’s overall appearance.
Commissioners voted unanimously to approve the expense last Thursday (July 23, 2009) during their second monthly meeting in the township municipal building on Buchert Road. The approval is subject to a review by township Solicitor R. Kurtz Holloway of an accompanying contract.
About 150 acres, roughly a third of the area, lie within Lower Pottsgrove boundaries, township Manager Rodney Hawthorne explained. The mapping effort will be the latest, and possibly final, step that must be completed before the two municipalities can start to address legal language that will help them with the district’s regulation.
Hawthorne reported representatives of both townships met most recently on June 5, 11 and 23 for district-related discussions and “made significant progress.”
Back in May, both townships agreed to cooperate in the district’s planning and development. Re-working the highway’s exit ramps, widening existing roads, creating a feeder or frontage road system, and installing traffic control systems there – all to accommodate future growth – is expected to cost tens of millions of dollars. Neither municipality can afford it alone, they concede.
Related (to the Lower Pottsgrove Board of Commissioners’ meeting of July 23):
- Board Approves Interchange Mapping Costs
- Commissioners OK Zoning Board Appointments
- No Need To Ask Them Twice
- Township Says No To Sunnybrook Grant, Citing Risks
- Commissioners Cancel Next Meeting
Related (to Sanatoga interchange development):
- Townships Agree To Interchange Planning
- Township Interviews For ‘Bigger Picture’
- Missing Walks Latest Bridge Complaint
- Trying, Trying Again At The Interchange
- Just One Speaker At Sanatoga Springs Hearing
- The Overlooked Users Of Sanatoga Springs
- County Suggests Cooperation On Sanatoga Springs
- Improving The Odds At The Interchange
- More About … Sanatoga Springs (No. 1 In A Series)
- Trial Balloon: An Inter-Municipal Agreement
- Lobbyists Court Lower Pottsgrove
- A New Arrival In “Sanatoga Springs”
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Lower has for years gotten the short end of the stick from Limerick Twp. Now they are asking us to buy in on a project that will undoubtedly benefit them the most as the majority of the business in ths plan is on their side of the line.
We ought to look closely at revenue base and determine what our elements of this master plan will contribute to the tax bottom line over a 20 year period versus the Limerick element.
Let’s start doing things that will benefit the townships residents and their tax purses. Is the 10K a good spend of hard won tax revenues? What do we stand to gain in this plan. Living in Woodgate right down the hill from all this I will be most impacted by roadway changes and the like. The plan I saw showed the installation of a dogleg atop of Rupert road. A very dumb idea indeed.
Let’s get the Taxpayers interest’s up front on this, not business, graft, or kickback…