Anonymous I am not, no matter what people I choose not to know and interact with say.
And within my own community if I think something is wrong. I stand up and I say so. Anonymous letters using probably someone’s voters list bother me. I received one such piece of mail a little while ago
I do not respect this. If you don’t like something in your community, don’t use a voter rolls list, stand up as a taxpayer and resident and say you don’t like something will we join you or will we talk about it, etc.
Anonymous lost me here. Not because of what bothers them necessarily, but because we as residents don’t know who is behind this mass mailing. How are we supposed to know if these people have our best interests at heart or their own personal agenda?
Well if they want me to listen (and perhaps that doesn’t matter to them) I would like to know which political party donated a mailing list and why we should listen?
Tell your neighbors if you are one of us and why. Plenty of the rest of us, myself included, stand up and are heard. Either do that or sit down.
This could very well be some out of the area slum lord. Or it could be a developer who might not be able to shove as many lemming apartments in.
And as much as I am not particularly in favor of Route 30 being widened, in places it is actually possibly necessary. But there have been meetings about this for years, it’s not a new topic.
This is as distasteful to me as the anonymous calls I received a few years ago telling me it was my job to get up and say the now former township manager wasn’t good, even if that hadn’t been my personal experience, you expected me to go to a township meeting while you hid in the shadows. I wouldn’t carry that water then, and won’t urge anyone to do so now if we don’t know who we are dealing with and why.
So whomever you are if you want community consideration, let us know you are actually one of us invested in our community. Until then, piss off with this throwback East Whiteland political skullduggery.
WTF East Whiteland Township? HOW MUCH ROUTE 30 DEVELOPMENT DO WE NEED? MORE FREAKING APARTMENTS?
OH BARF.
I mean seriously what is this bullshit?
This is planned for the Clews and Strawbridge property. 310 Lancaster Avenue Malvern/Frazer. Otherwise known as where the 18th century farmhouse has been rotting for YEARS and YEARS.
People time to contact East Whiteland Township. Go to meetings. Like yesterday. Chester County is going to sink under the weight of development. Our infrastructure can’t support this, our school districts can’t support this, we can’t continue to live like this.
If you live in East Whiteland Township or drive through this area or live in a municipality on either side of this area, please contact East Whiteland Township. It’s time for us to start standing up for what we want in our community and not just standing idly by like a bunch of sheep.
Stop the madness. Slow down development.
Supervisor E-Mails:
slambert@eastwhiteland.org
rorlow@eastwhiteland.org
pfixler@eastwhiteland.org
Township Manager:
sbrown@eastwhiteland.org
Assistant Township Manager:
cricardo@eastwhiteland.org
Be polite but if you OBJECT, PLEASE speak up.
NOT RELATED but Also don’t forget about the FIRE at a new construction site in West Whiteland on Lancaster Avenue right near Church Farm School. It was May 5th. As described by West Whiteland Fire Company:
At 8:18AM The West Whiteland Fire Company was dispatched to the 800 block of E. Lincoln Hwy. in the new neighborhood under construction for a commercial building fire. The West Whiteland Township Police Department arrived to find heavy smoke showing.
Employees tried to extinguish the fire with an extinguisher prior to calling 911, unfortunately giving the fire time to grow. Initial arriving crews stretched two hand lines to the first and second floors. Crews found fire coming from the floor of the second floor. An attempt was made to extinguish the fire, but the fire had already spread throughout the void space between the two floors. Due to collapse concerns crews were ordered to evacuate the building. The fire continued to grow rapidly and reached gas lines. Eventually the fire reached the attic space and caused a collapse of the HVAC system on the roof into the second floor. Crews then went into defensive operations with master streams. The fire was placed under control in just under an hour and a half. Crews cleared the scene at 1 PM after extensive overhaul.
Thank you once again to our mutual aid partners for your assistance at todays fire. Lionville Fire Company, East Brandywine Fire Company, First West Chester Fire Co., Engine Co. 51, Goshen Fire Company, Uwchlan Ambulance Corps, Good Will Fire Company #2 of West Chester and East Whiteland Fire Company.
Also, a big thank you to The Paoli Fire Company and their crew for standing by while we operated and helping our crews get the apparatus cleaned and back into service.
We all know that “UHHH OHHH, OHHHH NOOO” feeling when we see something. Like the real estate sign above. It is one of the two parcels that make up Johnson Matthey. To East Whiteland residents, Johnson Matthey is also a familiar name as one of the successor names to Bishop Tube over in General Warren, but I digress…only not really because things all seem to be related around her, right?
Another bite at the apple above was a post referring to the where’s Waldo as it keeps popping up issue in West Whiteland as to data centers and hydrogen plants etc there. It was a topic for discussion at the West Whiteland Planning Commission this Wednesday (oh and West Whiteland, that person your zoom bouncer didn’t let speak was ummm the chair of East Whiteland Supervisors, and since we all don’t live on islands, maybe learn who is on your calls. A neighboring township being interested should have some sort of professional courtesy, don’t you think?)
So. WHY is this 15.70 acres which is wooded with a cell phone tower of concern? Well Johnson Matthey wants to sell this chunk of their land on West King turning onto Phoenixville Pike is right on border with East Whiteland. Johnson Matthey is TWO parcels totaling 35+ acres.
And this is a real worry as to what kind of developer would snatch it up. Whether industrial or residential the scenario sucks. Because is it someplace they could put an Amazon hub for example? Or try to put a Data center or a hydrogen plant for example ? Or God knows how many townhouses or apartments?
And let us not forget Weston is across W. King Road, correct? And although residential plans have been shopped there it does have the labs and offices thing going on, right? And Johnson Matthey land has industrial going on correct? Is it as simple as 1 + 1 = 2? I hate to be a conspiracy theorist but this area right there in West Whiteland is truly the perfect storm for data centers and hydrogen energy plants, right? Are we wrong worrying about this? Like is the land at Johnson Matthey clean? As in DEP and EPA clean and isn’t that reasonable to ask considering it’s industrial?
The Johnson Matthey land for sale has a sign up and a listing on Loop Net for 15.70 acres. East Whiteland and West Whiteland need to pay close attention. They have to. First of all, how much more stress can W. King Road and that stress of Phoenixville Pike take? People who live on those roads have a hard enough time up and down getting out of their driveways and the ever increasing problematic four way stop sign and intersection of King and Ship is just up from there. It is already a shit show from existing development including West Goshen Township’s development. And next there is the piggy glut of development coming to Ship and 30 (Lancaster Avenue) and the rest of the development on the other side of the traffic light past the old Ship Inn, and east on Lancaster Ave towards the boundary there with East Whiteland.
This could be another bad plan coming our way when this property sells, couldn’t there be?
I also have *heard* via sources the intimation that some of the hierarchy of the Chester County Democrats don’t want to appear business “unfriendly” which is undoubtedly putting pressure on Democrat supervisors locally…like in East Whiteland and West Whiteland, right? But if these honchos are worried about appearing anti-business, are they also worried about appearing anti-resident and anti-environment? I think that could come into play here, sorry not sorry.
I also feel that in West Whiteland there is ONE Supervisor you can count on to do right by residents every time and that is Brian Dunn. Theresa Hogan Santalucia is now an angry lame duck politician, so she won’t care these next few months and Raj Kumbhardare is more pro-development and pro-data centers etc than I am comfortable with. He is not a bad person, however my opinion is at times he just doesn’t get it, and I have watched all of them, and he can dig in his heels and not for the benefit of all. He’s in the data kind of business for example given his career, so he doesn’t see the pitfalls, does he? Or doesn’t want to?
So I find this section of West Whiteland far, far away from not only the West Whiteland Township Building but also where two of the supervisors in West Whiteland live at risk. There are also multiple pipelines running around here including Williams which was mentioned somewhere when the whole data center hydrogen plant came up, right?
While we are on the topic of West Whiteland and data centers, allow me to share an update Ginny Kerslake sent out:
Good news from the data center / power plant zoning ordinance discussion at last night’s Planning Commission meeting in West Whiteland Township!
Over 20 residents attended to listen to the discussion and provide input on the public’s strong, universal opposition to allowing this use near our treasured Exton Park in the Office/Laboratory District. As a result, allowing this use in the O/L District appears to be off the table as far as the WWT Planning Commission is concerned. They are continuing the discussion next month. From there it goes to the Board of Supervisors and a public hearing. It’s important that we stay engaged as this proceeds.
Meanwhile, a proposed southeastern PA “hydrogen hub” called MACH2 would mean the construction of more fossil fuel infrastructure right here in Chester County including power plants, and dangerous, unregulated, CO2 pipelines in existing pipeline easements, including Mariner East and others. And it’s reasonable to assume that the proposed hydrogen power plant near Exton in Park was/is part of MACH2.
The time is now to do what we can to stop MACH2 from being awarded federal and state subsidies which it would require in order to advance.
I hope you can joinme and other community members protecting Exton Park this Sunday, April 23 from 3 to 5 PM at Stolen Sun in Exton for some food and drink (provided) to learn what next step you can take to stop this hydrogen hub …. and also celebrate our community’s recent victory in stopping the hydrogen power plant near Exton Park from progressing! RSVP here
A proposed southeastern PA “hydrogen hub” called MACH2 would mean the construction of more fossil fuel infrastructure, subsidized by taxpayers, including power plants, and dangerous, unregulated, CO2 pipelines in existing pipeline easements. And guess who’s a key player in MACH2 – Energy Transfer (Mariner East)
West Whiteland and East Whiteland residents need to pay attention here. Big time. We are all at risk from things like data centers because of PA’s tax credits for data centers. And certain political factions are pushing for these things so their besties can get contracts and jobs. And no ones really tales into consideration that a lot of the jobs are much like the jobs for Mariner East / Sunoco / Energy Transfer – out of state workers, not local. And yeah, sadly there are certain Democrats in Chester County push push pushing these things when they should be paying attention to their county row jobs, because what happens if audits on their county row job or a right to know is filed on their hours there happen? What will they show? Of course county row jobs in Chester County are a conversation for another day. Suffice it to say more than a couple should actually be spending more time earning their keep along county row and if they think even Democrats, let alone Republicans are not paying attention? Well that equals sadly mistaken, yes? Quit shilling for law firms, solicitors, and your union buddies from OUT of the area. Be present, be local, be for the residents you serve, not higher ambitions.
I am including photos of the streetscape so people have an idea. Why can’t that be bought and just left open space? A trail park?
Well, think about it people, because a buyer will come, and then potentially this is a fair bit of acreage in play if Weston wakes up again, this is oh hell no again, right?
It is never over in Chester County. And a lot of this is due to….wait for it…the Municipalities Planning Code of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania which has not been comprehensively updated since 1969. It requires an act of the state constitution which means State Reps and State Senators and they never seem to want to deal with this, do they? It would be nice if they did. It would be nice if residents were protected better and had more of a say as to the way they want their communities to look like.
The Johnson Matthey Land and Weston land if improperly developed could drastically impact our eco system in that area and the environment. And then let’s look at traffic and infrastructure. And more.
I am completely and utterly UNAPOLOGETIC for my opinion here. This is quite literally historic destruction. Radnor Township and the Radnor Historical Society did not lift a finger to save the Wayne Bed & Breakfast Inn from a developer’s bulldozer.
Complete and total waste. This was a historically important house for the area and RESTORED! It was bulldozed for a pretentious A.F. development that spread like venereal disease from DoDo land because you know you have to cram as many front end loaded McMansions in as possible. People don’t need gardens or room to breathe between houses, right?
This old house could have been incorporated into the development as a couple of condos and the pool a development community pool. And it is like no one in Radnor Township blinked an eye. No commissioner opened their mouth that I could see. Now maybe I am wrong but how hard did they try?
Look lively if you live in West Whiteland because Planning Commission on Tuesday April, 19th has data center/power plant zoning amendment crapola back for another bite at the proverbial apple 🍎 !
Residents need to turn out and say #NO again.
They already have giant data center planned for East Whiteland Township!
You don’t have to have this zoning in your Township and you really don’t want to allow the possibility for it. Just Google data centers and Louden County, Virginia.
Certain factions and developers out for an extra large pay day want this zoning but it does nothing for residents (kind of like the pipelines, truthfully.) it also sucks off your power grid which will eventually send your electricity prices up.
I had a dream last night that time had reversed and I was back in my old garden apartment in Lower Merion Township. It was more of a nightmare because the dream was water was leaking from the ceiling, which means the apartment above. Drip drip drip.
Now that actually happened when I lived there from the bathroom above into my apartment. It meant an open ceiling for a while. I say a while because the leak wasn’t handled by an actual plumber but a random handy person so it also took forever to fix.
As a matter of fact, every single time something was wrong, it was a fight to get a real person qualified to do the job. Yet we all stayed in these apartments because they were in a safe neighborhood in a decent municipality. And comparatively speaking, affordable and pet friendly. And the first floor units all had walled garden spaces. Sort of a late mid-century California style apartment buildings. I stayed for the location and that I could have a little garden.
But the landlord was kind of odd. They are all dead and building long sold to someone else, so I can actually write about this now.
It was a constant dance to stay on the good side of the landlord. And heaven forbid if you knew one of their kids they were mad at or on the outs with. You kind of got punished for that. I actually did get punished for that for a while. Like when the landlord threatened to evict me because he had been told by a nosy neighbor across the driveway my dog was barking. I had to buy a nanny cam to prove my dog’s innocence. Ends up the dog was barking because the nosy neighbor was peeking in my windows when I wasn’t home. If I had not been friendly with one of the kids he was on the outs with, he would have ignored the nosy neighbor because he liked dogs. The dog did me a favor in the end because who knew there was a peeping Tom?
Deferred maintenance was an understatement. Some people had front doors that were not even outside grade. Two women in the complex had doors that had holes and didn’t lock properly. We all had bars cut for windows and sliding glass doors because none of the locks worked. It was a marvel none of us were ever burglarized. I had windows that didn’t lock next to my kitchen door. Not that it would have been a stretch for anyone to break the non insulated glass of those windows and just reach in and open the door.
The landlord for the first couple of years I was there had these weird meters attached to the forced hot water lines that fed the baseboard heat into the apartments. That was how we were charged for heat in the winter, only the way the meters measured was kind of random and we found out somewhat illegal when a woman who’s dad was a judge somewhere upstate complained. The landlord was terrified of anyone connected to the legal professions so magically the meters went away and were never used again. And if you dated a lawyer, etc. you were totally left alone and always got what you needed fixed done.
The heater was a marvel. It was original to the building and amazing it ran without exploding. It was so bad no heating professional would certify it every year and apparently that was something that should have happened. Somehow Lower Merion Township missed that. Or more likely the landlord just ignored them when they did do rental property inspections because they didn’t have enough manpower to follow up. It was literally just one person doing inspections in a municipality with a LOT of rental properties.
We actually loved when our buildings were on the township rental rotation which was every other year or so. When the buildings were inspected that is when we had hope for repairs. Why? Because repairs were not in the deferred maintenance handbook. Not every apartment even had working smoke detectors unless we bought our own, which I did.
Every apartment had an in theory working fireplaces. Only the fireplaces were never cleaned or maintained or routinely inspected, so I never used mine after the first winter. A friend in another apartment actually discovered that they couldn’t use theirs because the flue would magically slam shut sending embers flying and another apartment had a blockage up the flue.
Every apartment had air conditioning. Except that they were the giant in the wall units which were increasingly hard to find and didn’t work half of the time or even well. You learned how to replace your own filters and unplug when the air conditioner cords got too hot. But if a unit failed and it was summer good luck. I had one fail in one room and it was not replaced the spot was simply boarded up. Good thing I lived alone and could deal with one less unit, because technically it was the second bedroom in the unit.
And then there was my kitchen floor. It bowed slightly and flexed which meant something was wrong underneath. I think it had been termites, but I forget now. If enough people had bounced on it at one time, I always wondered if it would collapse into the basement. It failed rental inspections multiple times over the decade plus that I lived there, landlord was cited but there was never follow up by the township or fines levied. Again, so many rental residential properties to inspect in a big township and only one person to do the inspections.
In the winter one of the things that the landlord really hated was hiring good snowplow guys. They hired the fifty cents variety so half of the time we all just had to shovel ourselves.
Yet we all stayed in these situations because it was hard to find decent apartments that were affordable. And that is still the case today everywhere. You trade off safety in your living space for affordability and a decent municipality. And landlords take advantage of that. Good rental landlords are the exception rather than the rule, even with complexes. That is still the case today.
And a lot of municipalities out here in Chester County don’t necessarily have defined rental ordinances. A property might get inspected for use and occupancy when it changes hands from owner to owner, but if it’s a rental property they might not have a clue as to what goes on otherwise. And if you complain to a municipality a landlord takes it out on the tenant.
And look at developments that are not necessarily rental developments. There are townships with townhouse developments that are turning increasingly renter versus owner occupied. The homeowners associations aren’t keeping up with this and neither are the municipalities. Which is one of the reasons I never buy the hooey spewed by developers talking about the wonderful developments where people live forever. They are actually creating transient communities where people have investment properties. They are not living there.
When you look at all the slumlord rental properties around in places and then you look at all of the damn apartments and packed in like lemmings townhouse and other developments, you wonder who will keep track of all the rental units? Often that’s a very good question because again, municipalities keep approving all of these developments yet once they get past the short term high of ratables, who will make sure everything stays as it should? The answers might surprise you.
When I have pointed out slumlords out here in Chester County and suggested that municipalities need residential rental ordinances and even off campus student housing ordinances I have taken heat. But if you have ever been a renter you know how important this is. Not everyone has the luxury of owning their own home, and I think we are seeing more renters because of the sheer volume of development.
There is also very little out here in the way of affordable housing, which also presents its own set of issues as a renter.
Ship Road and Route 30 in West Whiteland is getting supersized. Eventually the roads won’t even look the same when the “Ship Road Couplet” occurs.
What do I see that concerns me other than MORE development that will be soulless and devoid of charm and things like gardens? That beautiful historic chapel. I fear for it being marooned like a little island in the mess.
I also wish V.K. Brewing could remember the Ship Inn as part of their sign. Why can’t it be V. K. Brewing at the historic Ship Inn or something?
And this development? Naked acres baby. Just the way developers love it.
And there is this house (or twins?) being built right on the edge of Ship Road before the new development mess starts? It’s literally shoehorned in at the edge of the road. I guess they caused the road delays ?
The nice thing about this road work is it FORCED people on Ship Road to slow down.$
Sign me sick of developer-centric development. None of it seems to have anything with the communities the developers are invading.
How many more acres are going to get stripped bare for a cram plan? Now a broken down strip of stores and ugly other commercial structures aren’t going to be missed, but why is everything always about new density?
Why can’t we have good designs? Green space? Something attractive? Less dense ?
I can’t tell you how many people told me I didn’t know what I was talking about when I wrote the post recently about the old Wayne Bed and Breakfast Inn.
March 10, 2023
Well, one of my readers contacted me this afternoon and told me that she was being destroyed beginning today. A little while ago I was sent a picture which is the first one on this post.
Demolition has begun. Truly a goddamn waste.
This beauty is going with barely a whimper from Radnor Township. A property of historic import, which also had been lovingly and meticulously restored. In the place of this great house will be some soullessMcMansions, probably front and loaded to boot.
Also, now gone are so many of trees, and the beautiful gardens. And those gardens had some very old plantings. I think it was an ash tree that was very very old on this property and they didn’t even take cuttings from it. It survived when many of its species did not. Radnor Township pays lip service to being good environmental stewards and tree tenders too, in my humble opinion.
This is a waste. It is purely a waste. And I hope the ghosts of that bed-and-breakfast haunt that new development and future residents. This place could have had an adaptive reuse that could have been worked into this brand new development.
This is why I urged Radnor Township residents to start going back to meetings. And something you should start with sooner rather than later is Fenimore Woods. If you think Fenimore Woods should be left as woods, you know the way it was originally intended, don’t depend on an old politician to be your sole voice who has been commissioner so many times throughout the years that he can’t not act like a commissioner even when he’s not in office.
Get involved in your township before it’s too late. And get yourselves a new manager too. Maybe it’s time for all of you to start adding up all the crazy stuff that has happened under his watch. Are you really better off with him? Or don’t you deserve better? And yes, you can question who governs you and you should. You also deserve a manager who is accessible to residents and you don’t have that.
If any of you take photos of the demolition in process, or have old photos of this place, feel free to send them I will post them.
RIP Wayne Bed and Breakfast Inn at 211 Strafford Avenue in Wayne, PA.
Completely by accident last night when channel surfing on FiOS, I ended up at the Radnor Township Board of Commissioners meeting. Good lord.
I even sucked my husband in on this meeting and he literally said to me “Do these people really run that township?”
Sadly yes.
The whole meeting had issues, but the thing that drew me in and kept me watching was the Fenimore Woods of it all.
Start at the 1:37:00 mark (approximately.) Try not to be distracted by Tammy the Parks and Recreation Twinkie. She was wearing a shirt that you could see her bra through. And of course Madame President Mulroney speaks very nasally and her outfit was Escape from Harry Potter.
Fenimore Woods is just that, woods. And the parks and recreation Twinkie seems to want to spent a lot of OPM (Other People’s Money) to create a vision for this space that Radnor residents don’t even want!
The amount of money that the parks and rec Twinkie wants to spend is astounding! I’ll let you watch the meeting to listen for yourselves. But if she got her way, it would be well over $2 million! Basically it’s beg, borrow, and steal to get the money? Including potentially taking from Township reserve funds?
And public comments indicate that this project has been going on for a few years but the actual public has not exactly been part of the process all along? Talked about 2016 but the public not part of it until like 2021?
Fenimore Woods discussion from August 16, 2021 (starts at about 3:18:00)
120 plus trees being taken down in plans and more? Residents don’t want Fenimore tatted up municipal-style. Literally to destroy the tree canopy. Old growth woods. And look at that park in Garrett Hill, Clem Macrone? How many mothers will tell you how hot the playground equipment is because there are no longer enough trees?
Paul Road and Walnut in Wayne has an 18 acre subdivision planned. Where there once were trees and wildlife habitats? Naked acres with planned McBoxes? Valley Forge Military Academy has also been selling land off apparently including 500 feet from the entrance of Fenimore Woods which will be an assisted living facility? Added traffic, light pollution, loss of habitat in a part of Radnor Township that was so pretty. According to resident Matt Marshall that is 43 acres of tree removal and loss of habitat, traffic and light pollution already scheduled for the next 5 to 7 years before we get to the Fenimore Woods of it all, right? Matt Marshall used to serve on both the planning commission and as an interim commissioner. So he actually knows what he’s talking about and he’s asking them WHY are they doing this now? Why not just hit the pause button? Realize that this is a treasure without overbuilding? Good question right? Along with why is this plan SO far ahead without true and meaningful taxpayer input?
Jim Higgins a former commissioner with whom I have never had any love lost for also looked like he really wanted to scream and yell when making his points. He is very disturbed by the thought of this. And this is a commissioner that one of the reasons I never really loved, particularly much as he was the one who wanted to outlaw blogging or something once upon a time, crazy right? Well, last night he was spot on. Higgins reminded them Fenimore should be woods, “not a modern antiseptic commercialized place.” He called the plan “scary.”
Hence my whole thing with Radnor keep the woods in Fenimore. And truthfully, wouldn’t that make a great T-shirt or lawn sign?
Commissioner Maggy Myers was the only one who stood up for the residents. she cried bullshit on this whole thing throughout the entire meeting. As well, she should have because talk about. Oh my God, living up to the total cliché of tax and spend Democrats.
Residents want Fenimore to be as it is. Exactly as it is. Yes fix the pavilion and stables, but not some grandiose plan that the residents DO NOT WANT. Residents want a natural park. Care for the pond. Consider park as a whole. It’s not supposed to be Disneyland. There already are parks with lots of big playground spaces.
Can we talk about how Radnor got here? Can we talk about how Radnor doesn’t maintain the park land they have now much like a lot of other Main Line municipalities? Can we talk about how Radnor has left the stables which are supposed to be historic structures rot much like they’ve wasted the potential of the Willows Cotrage a second time? Can we talk about how Radnor supposedly was starting 2023 with a deficit and why would they even bring a plan like this forward now? And is there an actual deficit, if so, how much and why?
And what is the former finance guy now manager actually doing? Can you also say it’s a little hard to talk to your township manager when he’s got the pit bull running point in his office and if you don’t meet her sniff test you can’t talk to your manager and you pay for all of their salaries if you live in Radnor Township, don’t you? Bill White was a good finance guy but he is not a good manager. He did a lot of fast talking during this meeting last night, but I can’t get over the whole thing that it seems like certain inmates are running the asylum over there in Radnor, and why is that? And last time that got bad, they ended up with the Bashore of it all, didn’t they?
And let’s talk about the board of commissioners. Do they really know what’s going on within the entirety of Radnor Township? It seems to me that a lot of them not only don’t know the literal history of the township, they are painfully unaware of the political history, and shady ass past, aren’t they?
Fenimore Woods is but the latest example.
So Radnor, let’s make it simple, OK? Your residents pay the taxes, right? They don’t want Fenimore Woods to change the way the Parks and Rec Twinkie presented the plan last night. They quite literally want to KEEP THE WOODS IN FENIMORE. They can’t keep being a Tree City USA if they keep taking down the trees.
Patch has a rudimentary article up. But it doesn’t capture all the nuances of taking the time to watch the meeting. Radnor residents need to get busy with this or they will literally pave paradise and put up a parking lot.
Radnor Township is a hot mess. Also last night? If you were watching the meeting on FiOS, it got interrupted when Matt Marshall the former planning commission member was speaking and all of a sudden it cut into another meeting that took place at another time and you’re watching that video until a correction happened and it went back to the meeting last night.
Radnor residents better wake up sooner rather than later on this one and many other things. It’s not just a slippery slope of issues in this municipality right now, it’s more like a big mudslide.
Thanks for stopping by. Even you former Commissioner Jim Higgins, as I know you peeked. Astounding as it may seem to you, people are allowed to have opinions on this travesty even if they don’t live in Radnor.
Well dayyyyyuummm people, now there’s a headline. Kirkwood Farm AKA the Jackson/Rockefeller farm in Willistown appears to have been sold to M. Knight Shyamalan? So this means Shyamalan accomplished what preservationists in Willistown failed to do? Because as you know this is yet another large land parcel with no conservation easements pre-existing, right? I think people would be surprised by the list of whose big properties do not have conservation easements other than Rock Hill Farm. But hey that is a story for another day.
by Kevin Riordan and Frank Kummer Published Mar 24, 2023
Goodness the Inquirer sure scooped the rest of the media, didn’t they? And two of my favorite writers. Riordan and Kummer seem to be writing the stories that matter, the ones that people want to read. With the oddness that is print and television journalism these days, Chester County doesn’t get the same coverage it used to. Of course I remember when The Philadelphia Inquirer had a Chester County Bureau in West Chester, and The Daily Local News had a whole fleet of reporters covering Chester County from all angles. But the state of print journalism is an entirely separate conversation as well. But the only other people to cover it was Philadelphia Business Journal. Of course when they shared it on their Facebook page lots of comments ensued:
Heavy sigh. I am always amazed at what people don’t know about how government works either on a local level or state level. Yes I agree wholeheartedly that we need to have less development but people have no idea what has to happen to make that happen.
Local development is ruled by The Municipalities Planning Code of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania AKA the “MPC.” The MPC requires an act of the State Constitution to comprehensively change and update it. It has not been comprehensively updated since I think either 1968 or 1969. Interesting to note for Chester County residents the gargantuan development known as Chesterbrook was allowed to be built because of this code, correct public officials? For a little background on Chesterbrook read THIS.)
When the MPC was created, suburbs and exurbs looked different and were defined differently. But because this is the Bible that guides all the local zoning in the state, when elected officials literally tell you they can’t do things a lot of the time it’s because they can’t do things a lot of the time. But your state elected officials can indeed do things like enact an act of the state constitution and update the MPC. If they actually did that then we could have better and more meaningful historic preservation, land preservation, land conservation and possibly even some restrictions on development and as far as how much we have to have and what communities can say no to.
As it stands, property owners don’t (IMHO) have that much that makes historic preservation and land conservation appealing. If it was more appealing and if there were more tax breaks then maybe more would conserve and preserve. No maybe these are just my opinions but I don’t think so. All you have to do is literally look at the parcels of land in Willistown (and elwhich are not under conservation easements. One of the comments mentioned a place called Sweetwater farm. I didn’t even know that was for sale I thought that had sold a while back. (According to RedFin in 2021.)
So back to 944 Providence Rd in Willistown. So if M. Night Shyamalan has bought it, he achieved what no one else could and beat out developers. I remember when this place got listed it went under agreement I thought fairly quickly and then I never heard anything else about it. So I had forgotten about this, truthfully. Wonder what the fence protesters of Willistown think of him now?
It isn’t a pretty fence, but M. Night Shyamalan gets to keep it!
A judge in Chester County, Penn. has ruled that the “Sixth Sense” director can keep his 123-acre property wrapped in this yucky 8-foot high green mesh — much to the horror of his neighbors. I see pissed-off people!
Residents of Willistown Township complained that the plastic netting was an eyesore, but local officials ultimately sided with the filmmaker, who argued it was the only way to keep deer from decimating a network of floral gardens on the property he purchased in September 2006.
Hopefully they just thank M. Night Shyamalan and leave him alone this time, but pro-tip to him: it’s Willistown so don’t try to have a flower farm and avoid conversations about sewer sales and miles of concrete sidewalks…..
Willistown, Willistown, Willistown it’s always entertaining to learn your news.
