....Ardmore...development...Ardmore....development....SIGH.............

LM board wants developers to meet neighbors
By Cheryl Allison

Accounts differ as to where the breakdown occurred, but the fact is that the developers proposing a new apartment complex in downtown Ardmore had not met with the local civic association or other neighbors before a potential vote by Lower Merion commissioners last week.And that was reason enough for the board to call a halt to the discussion.

Faced with the possibility of a vote to deny its tentative sketch plan for a five-story, 70-unit building on the former Stuard Funeral Directors' Home site at 106 Cricket Ave., SW Land Associates agreed to extend the May 31 deadline for a decision by 30 days. The plan will likely come back to the board in June.

It's a relatively short delay for the development team. To at least some observers, though, it was a significant statement on the board's part about the importance of community outreach in the land development process.

Only two days earlier, Lower Merion's planning commission had voted to recommend approval of the plan, while acknowledging that there were important issues, including details on how the project will incorporate units affordable to lower– and moderate-income residents, to be worked out at the next stage of review.

But when the proposal was turned over for board deliberation shortly after 11 p.m. last Wednesday night, Vice President Maryam Phillips, the ward representative, said she frankly didn't know where to begin; she had questions about nearly all of a long list of proposed conditions of approval.

First, though, was her concern that development partners Mark Weiss and Craig Snider had not, as she had requested, met with the Ardmore Progressive Civic Association, whose area includes Cricket Avenue. In comments to the board, Ardmore Progressive's president, Steve Lindner, said the group had serious concerns about inadequate on-site parking, the height and mass of the proposed building, whether the apartments truly would be affordable, and how this development would relate to the township's ambitious Ardmore redevelopment project.

Lindner said the project, which proposes to use development standards created under Ardmore's MUST (Mixed-Use Special Transit District) ordinance, has brought to light "many unintended consequences of MUST."