Zoning board rejects shopping center expansion plan
The South Union Township Zoning Hearing Board on Tuesday denied a request from the owner of the Cherry Tree Square shopping center to allow the firm to expand the existing Wal-Mart store with fewer parking spaces than a township ordinance requires. However, property owner Gustine Uniontown Associates Ltd. of Pittsburgh has the option to ask the township supervisors to change that ordinance.
“That might be the right way to follow it, but I need to chat with my client about what they want to do,” Gustine attorney David Toal said after Tuesday’s zoning board action.
The board held a lengthy hearing last month on a petition by Gustine for a variance on the number of parking spaces required by the township’s zoning ordinance, which calls for 10 parking spaces per 1,000 square feet of retail space. Gustine proposed adding parking spaces to accommodate a larger Wal-Mart, but the plan called for half the spaces required by the ordinance.
The board considered the request last month but took no action at that time. Chairman Ralph Barclay said at the initial hearing that Gustine might have approached the wrong board with its request, saying the township supervisors have authority to change the ordinance to reduce the number of required parking spaces.
Toal gave the zoning board a legal brief at the beginning of the continued hearing Tuesday, and Barclay called for an executive session, which solicitor Simon John said was to review the brief as a quasi-judicial board. After the 25-minute session, Toal gave a summary.
“The issue is simple,” Toal said.
The existing site has a ratio of 5.44 parking spaces per 1,000 square feet of retail space, and Gustine proposed reconfiguring the parking lot to accommodate 5 parking spaces per 1,000 square feet of retail space, a figure Toal argued is the national standard.
The board voted to deny the variance and offered no further discussion.
Toal said the parking issue is the first step in the plan to expand Wal-Mart and reconfigure the shopping center. If the zoning board would have granted the variance, Toal said, Gustine next would go to the township supervisors with a land-development plan.
He said the next step now would be up to his client.
The 14.02-acre shopping center features the existing 121,267-square-foot Wal-Mart store and another 99,956 square feet of retail space. Parking spaces in the shopping center now number 1,209, or 5.44 parking spaces per 1,000 feet of retail space.
The expansion of the existing store would encompass 201,161 square feet, and the remaining retail space in the shopping center would include 79,808 square feet. Under the plan, Gustine would expand the Wal-Mart into the adjacent space being vacated by Family Toy Warehouse and add some new construction to the building.
The plan was to reconfigure the existing parking lot and add 195 new spaces for a total of 1,404 spaces. During testimony at the initial hearing, the Gustine representatives argued that the parking lot is never full and that they simply were asking for the national standard.
A Wal-Mart Supercenter was part of an announcement last year in the first phase of a development by Widewaters Uniontown Co. LLC of Dewitt, N.Y., behind the Gustine property, although talk of relocating the store since has been abandoned.
In another matter, the zoning board reorganized for the year.
Barclay, who was vice chairman, accepted appointment as chairman, and the board named previous Chairman Terry McMillen, who was absent, as the vice chairman.
The board named Andy Nemchik as secretary and Shaunna Frankhouser as assistant secretary, a non-voting position, and retained John as solicitor.