Plymouth Township just said NO to the data centers?
Why?
Simple there is NO permitted use under the Municipalities Planning Code of the Commonwealth of PA for data centers. It’s NOT a warehouse. Ginny Kerslake has been saying this forever and places like East Whiteland keep telling her she is wrong, right?
Further and somewhat related apparently developer is trying to get these places classified as warehouse locations even though it’s energy and isn’t that nuts sounding?
Last question for people is do we think developers are going through approval processes for data centers in order to flip the properties? Didn’t that come up at recent Upper Merion Planning Commission meeting?
Would someone kindly tell me what is in the water in East Pikeland Township??? And I am not talking about the superfund site (yes there is a fairly large one and where are all of the monitoring wells and plumes and what not?? https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/CurSites/srchsites.cfm )
Every time you turn around, there seems to be something funky oozing out of East Pikeland isn’t there? My guess is they don’t want anything oozing out of there correct?
Kimberton AKA East PIkeland has a largeish superfund site so why don’t they talk about it much?
Would she be the one to ask this of? Or would people ask the supervisors led far too long by that unnaturally red-haired old man and his underlings who do his bidding?
The thing about superfund sites is there really is no safe distance away from them is there? It all varies depending upon the contaminants, wind patterns, local groundwater flow, and cleanup status, doesn’t it? While the EPA investigates and remediates these areas, studies often highlight according to what I have seen, approximately a 1 to 3-mile radius as an area of potential or actual exposure don’t they? Or is that wrong?
Hazardous stuff can migrate can’t it? I mean that is why people living around the Foote Mineral EPA site in East Whiteland (which isn’t so far from the Kimberton site, is it?) are freaked out by even earth being moved for that planned data center, right?
In 1992, The Philadelphia Inquirer did a pretty big spread of an article on Kimberton and how organic the area was. Laura Quinn the reporter of an article dated August 28, 1992 titled the article “A Place Where The Cows Eat Organic”. Today when I saw that in the archives I had to snort. I will share some screenshots of some dead and buried newspapers about Kimberton I find amusing at the end – just not that Inquirer article as I can’t find an archive link on their website. It is a shame I can’t find it on their website to be able to share a link if you subscribe… but anyway, article did happen.
According to this article from 2008, there was a lot of trichloroethene (TCE) dumped into multiple “pools” and oh shades of Bishop Tube which never became a superfund site in East Whiteland and is still contaminated, right? Also the article mentions that back then (18 years ago now) they had been removing lots of “volatile organic compounds” from ground water and then when the waste was filtered and decontaminated or something it went into the French Creek? (umm, ick???)
Also according to the EPA stuff online, supposedly between 1947 and 1959, a predecessor of Ciba-Geigy manufactured epoxy resins and textile products there. Overall research from the EPA etc indicates that chemical residues were primarily trichloroethene (TCE), dichloroethene (DCE), and vinyl chloride. A nice toxic cocktail in organic land much?
When you put this crap into Google, this comes up:
Remedial Cleanup Actions
Operable Unit 1 (OU-1 – Drinking Water): EPA mandated an alternate water supply in 1988 due to residential well contamination. Individual local wells were initially treated using granular activated carbon (GAC) adsorption filtration. A permanent public water supply line was fully installed in 1992, removing local dependency on contaminated private wells. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Operable Unit 2 (OU-2 – Source & Groundwater Control): A comprehensive groundwater pump-and-treat system was launched in December 1993. Extraction wells capture the contaminated water before it leaves the property bounds, running it through an on-site air stripping treatment facility. [1, 2]
Institutional Controls: Mandatory deed restrictions are enforced to prevent groundwater exposure, block the drilling of new domestic wells, and preserve the integrity of the protective caps over the former lagoons and septic areas. The site achieved Sitewide Ready for Anticipated Use (SWRAU) status in 2018. [, 2]
Then there is Roberts Packing (meatpacking?) which is a CERCLA site. So that I think means it is a hazardous waste location managed under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (1980).
Also not that long ago a resident asked a simple straightforward question:
Then there is this:
Basically you have to wonder what is going on and what has been going on for decades in East Pikeland Township? Ron Graham has been a supervisor since 2008 and chair of that board since 2009, yes? To quote (him) on the website:
Ron believes that efficient and successful governance is based on integrity, open communication, compromise rather than confrontation, and sound fiscal organization.
Mmmkay Ronnie old man (and you are dude complete with unnaturally red hair), if you believe in integrity and open communication, maybe its time for (a) a completely new board of suprvisors (won’t say new chair because the currents do your bidding don’t they?); (b) a ballot referendum to add 3 more supervisors under the 2nd class township; (c) actual transparency and open government; (d) no more bully politics? Also how can this dude been chair of the board since 2009? It’s good to be king right?
This Kimberton Superfund site gives me the willies. Read that new thing. Test your wells and groundwater. Question it all residents, it is your right. And if you start to flip the board, you can also get township administration and solicitors (including zoning) that you trust, yes?
And speaking of questions what happened with the recent zoning hearing board and the hippies are us thing being planned Altair Eco Village? That is partially on superfund land isn’t it? Has stormwater issues?
I don’t know but in my opinion, East Pikeland needs a whole lot of sunshine and residents need to question everythng.
My opinions are brought to me by the first amendment. No McPhails need apply, do they? (Yeah I knew about that East Pikeland.)
I also think Erin Brocovitch would also love East Pikeland. maybe if lots of East Pikeland folks contacted her about the Kimberton Superfund site, more answers would be forthcoming?
East Pikeland maybe no more cloudy sunshine free days are in order? Unless y’all are vampires?
Here are the funky newspaper clipping from dead papers:
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. RIP Blackburn Farm at 1135 Sugartown Road in Easttown Township – from the dust another McMansion of the nouveau will rise?
Who knows.
But yet another piece of Chester County history is now gone forever.
The gorgeous house that sat at the crest of a small hill that you could see as you went up. The long driveway was demolished the other day.
Blackburn Farm was part of Chester County’s equestrian and agricultural past as well as part of the tradition of the Devon Horse Show before that went bougie obvious. For 31 years it was part of the staging for the horse show. I believe it mostly had to do with carriaging from what I read on the Tredyffrin Easttown Historical Society website (I do belong to this organization and they have the most wonderful historical publications.)
It looks like in the early 2000s is when that development behind Blackburn farm was subdivided and developed. Originally I think the parcel was 100 acres or better.
I was actually on the farm once for a very special house tour posted by the Tredyffrin Historic Preservation Trust.
The last photo set in this post is Blackburn Farm.
The whole property was quite magical and obviously well loved and well-maintained. When the owner listed it for sale just because it was time to downsize, it never occurred to me in my wildest dreams that it would be destroyed like this.
Yes, I understand that people have their private property rights. But why do you buy a spectacular historic property with other than a need for maybe some updating because that’s just a necessity every now and again, only to destroy the history quite literally?
I can’t even imagine how the prior owner felt. I know I would be so sad if one of my childhood homes had been demolished, and of course there’s no guarantee that that won’t happen someday.
It’s so weird a concept to realize that I’ve visited some of these amazing homes that have made Chester County so beautiful and some of them have been torn down. This is one reason why I think it’s so important to save the Darlington Inn in Westtown.
It’s a shame in Pennsylvania historic preservation means so little. It’s paid lip service, but we can have data centers right?
I have not seen a public notice or media report on this yet but sources in the courtroom are saying Kurt Schenk’s trial has ended in a mistrial I guess yesterday?
Former District Attorney Deb Ryan who is now Judge Ryan was the judge listed on the docket.
What I was told is trial DID end yesterday in a mistrial and supposedly 8 out of 10 jurors found the accused guilty. The victim’s family must be devastated but is it the end?
A mistrial is a non-ending isn’t it ? It is not innocence is it? The case can return to a pretrial state unless the prosecutor (DA) dismisses the charge, the court (judge) bars retrial, or the parties resolve it by plea right?
So again a mistrial does not mean innocence correct? I am sure the accused’s supporters will say that right? Ironically looking at the docket yesterday was the man’s birthday so he has a present for now? But does he?
What happens next? I don’t know, hopefully someone will report on this or some statement will come from the DA.
The victim, the young woman, is special needs. We all know how defense attorneys can treat victims because their job is to get the accused out of a situation right? God don’t like ugly and I believe in that.
What we CAN’T have here is street justice. We might not like the outcome but we have to abide by the law or we become as bad as those accused of crimes.
Hold this young woman and her family in your hearts and prayers.
And that church he is a minister of? New Beginnings Church of the Cross? Just don’t go to it.
Waiting like all of you for formal reports or media reports. As a woman I am seriously sad right now. I feel very strongly about crimes against women. It took TWO years for this to come to court. For that young woman and her family in my opinion that must have been two very long and possibly agonizing years.
The accused is someone who has been in the spotlight before when he was a politician in Coatesville. I did a newspaper search and for The Philadelphia Inquirer alone it showed that he was in 16 Coatesville related articles from the early 2000s in addition to the 2024 article. And then there was Daily Local, a paper in Coatesville etc. So my whole thing is every time this guy comes up in a media related thing like a newspaper article. It’s never very positive is it? (And yes that is my opinion you read newspaper archives, and tell me what you think.)
Like I have said many times before crimes against women is something that resonates with me. And in my opinion, this stuff probably happens more than we are informed about because so many women are afraid to come forward because of the way they are treated in court and isn’t that the truth?
My heart goes out for this young woman who is special needs, who is on the spectrum of something. She was very brave to come forward and I hope she finds closure in the event the court system is unable to attain it for her.
Sometimes Lady Justice doesn’t get the result people think she should and then I think sometimes she just weeps. And sometimes there is just karma and maybe this isn’t the end of the story for this young woman or any young woman in the future right?
What I keep thinking about is a hung jury and a mistrial isn’t an acquittal. It’s not innocence. It’s just its own thing in the legal system. But it doesn’t mean that the accused is innocent does it?
My final question is was 13 hours too short to deliberate?
Packed house in Westtown Township and I hear many are calling out Supervisor Tom Foster and it’s not Ollie Ollie Oxenfreed.
Oh and breaking news they fired the entire historic commission on bullsheit trumped up charges.
Jodi Nawrocki ran for office trying to convince people she loved historic preservation, and what’s her first big act as a supervisor and the baby chair of the supervisors who doesn’t know how to run a meeting? To axe a volunteer commission. I guess she still believes in the tooth fairy if she expects to believe that this has nothing to do with the Darlington Inn or politics. she is just one of three disgraces, but she’s the only Democrat on the board and she might as well just be Tom Foster’s Sarah Palin.
Oh and former non-profit name- dropping- former -stupidvisor Carol DeWolf? I love love love the ego in you that you can’t bother to introduce yourself to the audience. You’re not the queen freaking mother, but you are still obnoxious, and now that you’re just regular old Carol from Westrown I think you can just stand at the podium like a normal person.
There is no point in being subtle here. This is a complete shit show and a travesty. This is obviously political and if you’re on a board in Westtown, you should just resign now before they fire all of the rest of you.
And that manager, she needs to go to. She also doesn’t know what in the Sam hell she’s doing.
What a freaking joke. Except it isn’t is it? This is actually really bad for residents and I’m allowed to have that opinion too.
So how can they get rid of that entire board of stupidvisors and the manager? and in the meantime, I hope everyone on that historic commission knows that they are entitled to a televised hearing and bring lawyers.
Montauk NY’s Pine Barrens. Ravaged by fire and Southern Pine Beetles. 2026 photo.
The photo above is how I am feeling this afternoon. Empty, chewed up, and feeling a little…well…betrayed. I have expressed this in Italian (which is rather embarrassingly rusty) as I am still living with the excellence of Lisa Scottoline’s latest book which made me channel my inner Italian.
So friendship is and always has been a big deal to me. We are only as good as our word in this life. Last night a friend, not an old for decades friend, but a more recently minted variety contacted me and flew completely and undeservedly off of the proverbial handle with me. Flipped out. Accusing me of craziness and “back stabbing” and what are we 12? Is this the 8th grade lunch table or something?
What happened in truth is people who don’t like them being friends with me, whispered in this person’s ear. I have never been anything but honest and straightforward with this person, and a friend. I got the big mad in addition on things where this person ASKED my opinion – I was not offering my opinion, there is a distinct difference. I also got a big mad from them over a conversation we never actually had.
So here we have another case of gossip and the human effect.
The person who flipped out on me sent a text to say they were sorry. That’s nice but what they did? Literally created in me a sense or feeling of betrayal: Un senso di tradimento. Sadly this makes this a trust issue. Which means if this heals, it will take time.
I can’t control what people whisper in someone’s ear. Not everyone has to like everyone else, but it is super sleazy to interrupt another human’s friendships just because you don’t like one of their friends, and it is that simple and you can simply choose not to be around that person when the mutual friend is with them.
I am also not a punching bag. Friends don’t treat friends like shit.
Trust is a big deal, so right now, I have got nothing except literally un senso di tradimento.
I gave myself the day and binge read a book today.
The book is SO wonderful, a literal page turner.
The book is by one of my favorite contemporary authors, Chester County and Philadelphia’s own Lisa Scottoline.
To begin with, this book (This Changes Everything) is the novel which follows as a related but not necessarily a sequel (unless we have a set of new amazing characters for a series??) to The Unraveling of Julia.
Read The Unraveling of Juliafirst. Then gobble up This Changes Everything.
Both of these books are THAT good and it also features one of my favorite characters from Scottoline books, Bennie Rosato.
There is murder, intrigue, Tuscany, and upstate Pennsyltucky small towns that are full of secrets and corruption.
There are so many nods in this book to what is going on today that it is real, current, plausible, and fascinating. History is woven in and more, including recipes, if you pay attention . If you have ever felt a little fey and had yourself an inexplicable premonition or two, even a weird feeling that was a harbinger of something else, you will also enjoy this book.
I don’t pretend to know Lisa Scottoline , although I have met her in years past. Once upon a Time when the Barnes & Noble in Bryn Mawr first opened, and Lisa was first a novelist, my mother handled the events for the bookstore. She had Lisa there a few times that I remember.
I have been a somewhat devoted reader over the years. Since about 1995. I haven’t read all of her short works, but I think I’ve pretty much read all of her novels and I used to love her column for The Philadelphia Inquirer. 
I totally see the unraveling of Julia and this changes everything as being a two-part Netflix series or something on Apple or Prime Video. I could see Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine production company taking this on.
Anyway, I don’t belong to a book club or anything like that I just like to read, always have. And there is nothing I love better than a book that literally won’t let you put it down. It is fast paced and as twisty turny as a good Chester County back road.
This is a book that I won’t give away. Much like The Unraveling of Julia.
And before anyone gets any absurd ideas in their head, I wasn’t asked to write this post. I’m not compensated for writing this post. I bought my copy of the book on Amazon. It arrived Friday and I read it today.
Buy the book and read it or borrow it from a friend or the library. You’ll be glad you did.
So would somebody please tell this baby Trumpophile that I might not be enamored of Kristine Howard but why am I being quoted on his freaking flyers he’s handing out in Malvern Hunt about data centers?
I mean one minute with Chester County Republicans I am literally the devil incarnate and the next minute they are quoting ME?
FFS so we are crystal clear: I don’t know him and I’m certainly not endorsing him. Let him do his own damn work.
Literally, I have never met this person. He has not reached out and now he can stuff it.
He’s just using my words.
Literally I did not know this guy existed until this afternoon.
And I guess that’s what politicians do, correct? They use the words of others because they can’t find their own?
And if he’s running around town with the likes of Melissa what’s her name who seems to run for something every season and ran her teenage daughter once for school board? Yeah no desire to meet him for that reason either.
Sometimes it is better to ask for permission than to beg for forgiveness.
But I do have to kind of laugh at the idea of anyone quoting me to get elected public office. I guess I must only be an evil blogger on alternate Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Oy I can’t with this chick “Carly Closes.” Today it’s like Carly does Wayne, and is that like Debbie does Dallas? Dunno. She is going to say I am a petty beeatch, but this time she is co-opting literally one of my most favorite bits of quirky history. So favorited by me that I got a state approved historical marker that I still check on every time I am in Wayne.
Please note this is a public post a la wants to be an influencer on social media.
Let ME get into it. First and foremost, she can’t even pronounce what she’s trying to co-opt to shill with. She is speaking about the Wayne Natatorium in North Wayne. She doesn’t even have the location right. Literally the pool was Willow Avenue in North Wayne, Little Chicago. That’s right— where Willow Avenue is today was the pool. They blocked up the Gulph Creek to fill the pool, as well as utilizing springs underground and it was very popular for a short amount of time.
It was the largest outdoor pool in the country and one of the largest in the world at the time. There were swimming championships, and there was ice-skating in the winter. There were ladies and men’s dressing rooms, and there was a clubhouse and at the end of Willow Avenue before it takes the dog leg part of that clubhouse used to exist until there was a fire and when they rebuilt it, I don’t know if they saved any of it because there was a really cool fireplace and that then rental property that was from the original clubhouse.
This is a photo from around 2005 I think of the clubhouse fireplace mantel I mentioned
Carly implies with her interpolation that it was like a sideshow circus freak kind of an attraction and it really wasn’t that. It was part of Wayne at the time. So can I say thousands and thousands past through the pool? No, because I don’t think we really know. The other thing is it wasn’t just drought that caused the pool to fade in popularity other things gained popularity like cycling as in bicycles and golfing. While it was open it was popular. And there were swimming championships and exhibitions.
Again, I know about the Wayne Natatorium because I got the sign for it. Yes indeed I really did. I went to the board of commissioners in October 2009 in Radnor Township to get their approval. I wrote the application I raised the money, my nonprofit sponsor was the Radnor Historical Society. But I did the work. The chair of the historical society at the time was Ted Pollard and he told me back then I was on my own because he was focused on getting a sign for Bishop Richard Allen when he visited the Bryn Mawr section of Radnor somewhere off of Bryn Mawr Avenue probably close to where the WaWa is today if I remember it correctly. In 2009 they dedicated a small park on Brook Street in Bryn Mawr to him. At the time, Ted Pollard told me to wait and I said no because whatever the state emphasis was that year for historical markers, I felt the Wayne Natatorium stood a better chance of making it. And in the end I was right. The Bishop Allen Historical marker didn’t actually make it to marker status until 2023.
Two people in particular from Radnor Historical Society were instrumental in helping me and letting me into the archives of the historical society at Finley House. One was Greg Pritchard, who is now history everything with Lower Merion Township and is the Lower Merion’s HARB person. The other was Beverlee Barnes, who is the preservation planner at the Delaware County Planning Department.
Some of my other great supporters of this project back in the day is former commissioners John Nagle and Hank Mahoney, Sam Strike who used to be with the Suburban and Wayne Times, Bob Zienkowski now manager of East Vincent, my late friend Andy Lewis who was on County Council in Delaware County, as well as being a Haverford Township Commissioner during his life, and another dearly departed member of the Radnor Township community, Steve Paolantonio.
So seriously, I really want cool history preserved, and I want people to love the history, but when people co-op the history for personal gain, (and I’m entitled to that opinion, this is a public post across social media platforms) I think that’s wrong.
And if you’re going to speak about local history at least correctly pronounce what you’re speaking on. Otherwise you sound ridiculous and twatwaffleish.
*Note a lot of this was my own research, some of the items came courtesy of the Radnor Historical Society and their archives. The newspaper I showed screenshots of called The Philadelphia Times was in existence from 1875-1902, when I think it was merged into The Public Ledger.*
The Wayne Natatorium was written about in defunct Philadelphia area newspapers at the turn of the century and the Philadelphia Inquirer has written about it here and there including August of 1992. That article spoke about Fennimore Lake, Martin’s Dam, Mill Dam, places that no longer exist like Lea’s Lake, Cathcart Lake and the Wayne Natatorium.
In January 1896 there was a “Ghost Carnival”. The folks who attended back then we Main Line and Philadelphia notables and executives and families of the Pennsylvania Railroad. (Philadelphia Inquirer, January 19, 1896)
The Philadelphia Inquirer in 1899 also reported on an “enjoyable skating carnival.” (Philadelphia Inquirer, January 15, 1899)
At the end here are my photos and photos friends gave me from when we dedicated the sign – we received commendations from the state as well as Delaware County. We had Radnor Township officials present, my (then) home township folks from Lower Merion Township there, state representatives and a state senator.
So Aesop still says when Carly wants to close her mouth instead of the sound of her own voice, she might actually learn something. But until then she will be just another realtor using the area’s history as a social media marketing tool.
I hope you all have enjoyed actually learning about the Wayne Natatorium today.
Cheers! Hope the Canadian Wildfire smoke clears soon, don’t you?
Sign of the times taken by someone NOT trespassing.Not my photo, saw it on social media. Corporate welfare bought to you by Governor Josh Shapiro. Residents are always optional in his equations.
East Whiteland Township, Chester County is just a place where most honestly feel government pays lip service for every shitty thing that happens. Well not everyone. Some just ignore us altogether like State Representative Kristine Howard. She literally does nothing and says nothing. Never shows up for anything in her district. But she is BFFs now with neighboring State Representative Danielle Friel Otten whom people elected as a pipeline activist and that didn’t last long as she just wanted to sit at the popular kids table in Harrisburg and is a sell out.
Governor Josh Shapiro is everywhere as he is up for re-election. But he is busy having his literal neighbors dislike him and handing out corporate welfare as that sign in East Whiteland indicates. Yes I can have that opinion while I say I told you so. Shapiro has always been exactly who he is.
If anyone had been paying attention except for some of us, they would have seen it back when he was former Congressman Joe Hoeffel’s Chief of Staff (1999-2003). We certainly saw it when we were starting to fight eminent domain for private gain in Ardmore, PA. It was literally his job to help and/or at least listen to Hoeffel’s constituents. He didn’t and I can distinctly remember him avoiding residents in Ardmore at a town hall meeting in early eminent domain days. The meeting was at a senior center in Ardmore.
Now we don’t really have a viable choice on the other side of the aisle, just Marge Simpson, err Stacy Garrity. That woman was pro-data center until a lightbulb went off and she thought she could maybe get two extra votes and she flip flopped to being sort of against them.
There is one person whom we know cares 100%: State Senator Katie Muth. She is a fierce mama bear for all of us. She cares. She shows up.
I guess I just don’t understand how anyone thinks this data center or any data centers are OK. I also don’t understand one of the East Whiteland Supervisors after finding this video:
Now he is only one of three supervisors. But like with many other municipalities, you have at least one who thinks data centers are wonderful and the hypocrite tree hugger in that video from NBC 10 above that’s on YouTube is the one in East Whiteland. According to this media report and subsequent research, he apparently works for Morris Arboretum owned by the University of Pennsylvania so does that mean Morris Arboretum and Penn are pro data centers?
But the rest of the East Whiteland board? It’s like they are doing fear based governance. They are so afraid of what might happen to them that they’re not thinking about what will happen to the all of us and aren’t I allowed to have that opinion? Shouldn’t the courage of your convictions mean something when you’re an elected official? I mean, if you can’t stand up for the people who elected you why are you in office? What are you getting out of it?
Today, as I was standing outside in my garden, looking into my woods, I was pondering all of this. I will share my thoughts next in a little video, and then I will share some video snippets from the most recent East Whiteland meeting and some other stuff.
I’m sad. I am sad that we don’t matter. I’m sad that our local environment doesn’t matter. And I am fearful we will run out of water and not be able to afford our power. No one has been able to allay these fears and I don’t think they really can and I’m allowed to have that opinion too.
