L. MACUNGIE TWP., Pa. \u2013 Action on a preliminary\/final land development plan for Lower Macungie Mixed Use Development LLC at 617 North Krocks Road was postponed at the applicant\u2019s request, township officials said Thursday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Shoppes at Hamilton\u201d is planned for a 54.1-acre site on North Krocks Road, across the bypass from Hamilton Crossings and adjacent to Route 222, in the Highway Commercial zoning district.<\/p>\n
Lower Macungie\u2019s Planning Commission previously supported the project, which included several phases.<\/p>\n
Phase 1 calls for a 318-unit apartment community in 10 three-story buildings; a 160-room hotel on a separate lot; 19,800 square feet of retail, dining or service space; and amenities including a clubhouse, pool, dog run and sports courts.<\/p>\n
Two private roads would provide access to the apartments. The plan proposes 630 parking spaces for the residential portion, 170 for the hotel and 96 for the commercial area. Four stormwater detention basins are included.<\/p>\n
Phase 2 will add 102 apartments, bringing the total to 420. A traffic impact study estimates the completed development will generate 342 new non-internal or pass-by vehicle trips per hour during the afternoon peak.<\/p>\n
Also Thursday, township commissioners interviewed two prospective Planning Commission and Zoning Hearing Board members, Anthony Branco and Adrian Niles.<\/p>\n
Branco, a former township manager, said he is motivated because he \u201cwants to volunteer in his community.\u201d<\/p>\n
He commended officials for protecting open space and emphasized the importance of research as communities develop and grow.<\/p>\n
As an example, he cited a recent decision by the neighboring Upper Macungie Township Board of Supervisors, which approved an interim zoning amendment to incorporate data centers into the use table and provide regulations until new zoning districts and comprehensive rules are developed.<\/p>\n
Niles, a longtime small-business owner, said he would \u201clove to see the township focus on smart growth\u201d and offered ideas for future direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver time, (the township) should consider trying to win more companies to get headquarters here,\u201d he said, noting the tax benefits a headquarters can bring.<\/p>\n
Candidates will be informed of the board\u2019s decision at a later date, officials said.<\/p>\n
In other business, township officials rejected bids for the Ash Lane Bridge replacement project after recently learning of a potential development north of the site.<\/p>\n
The project called for removing the existing steel-grate bridge and building a wider reinforced-concrete span.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re rejecting bids until we can identify that we don\u2019t have to make any adjustments to what we\u2019re proposing in our design,\u201d Township Manager Bruce Beitel said.<\/p>\n
The project was publicly advertised with bids due Oct. 20, and the township reserved the right to reject any or all proposals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"L. MACUNGIE TWP., Pa. \u2013 Action on a preliminary\/final land development plan for Lower Macungie Mixed Use Development…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[30422,119,121,120,30425,30423,30424,22638,30426,4836],"class_list":{"0":"post-54612","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allentown","8":"tag-adrian-niles","9":"tag-allentown","10":"tag-allentown-headlines","11":"tag-allentown-news","12":"tag-anthony-branco","13":"tag-bruce-beitel","14":"tag-lower-macungies-planning-commission","15":"tag-planning-commission","16":"tag-upper-macungie-township-board-of-supervisors","17":"tag-zoning-hearing-board"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}