November 14, 2024

The Henderson Group wants to erect a new building at Painters Crossing shopping center. Henderson President and CEO Brian Coyle, along with attorney Marc D’Amico, and an engineer, took the idea to the Chadds Ford Planning Commission Wednesday night, but no decisions were made.

According to D’Amico, the planned building would cover three pads at the southeast corner of the shopping center. Those pads had been occupied by Farmers’ Road, Arby’s, and the first location for El Gran Rodeo. Those pads were demolished two years ago. Plans are to replace them with one structure of 15,000-plus square feet. The new building could house up to five new businesses, with one being a restaurant with a drive-thru.

Because of the possibility of the drive-thru lane and an outdoor dining area, Henderson would need conditional use approval from the Board of Supervisors. It would also need supervisors’ approval for the land development. The Planning Commission needs to review the plans before making any recommendation to the supervisors.

D’Amico said the plans have already been submitted to the Delaware County Planning Commission, which will look at the plans later this month.

He said the new buildings “would result in a very slight increase in impervious coverage, but there will also be stormwater management improvements as part of this.”

Coyle said the former buildings were demolished in 2022 with the hopes of working with “good quality national retailers to come in and help us reimagine what this corner of the shopping center would look like.”

He added that Henderson retained the services of a brokerage firm to find tenants, but there are no potential tenants yet. However, he said Henderson has gotten good feedback on the concept and hopes with the ability to work out details with the township so that construction could start sometime in early 2025 and wrap up later that year or in early 2026.

Coyle also said that being able to show retailers that the building is under construction would help in getting signed leases.

Since there are no tenants yet, it’s unclear how many will be housed in the new location. Coyle said it could be just one tenant, but the building is designed so that it could house five units of 3,000 square feet each.

Commission Chairman Craig Huffman said there would be no action taken that evening because it was just the start of the conversation.

One of the sticking points at this preliminary stage is the proposed drive-thru for the planned new building. It starts as two lanes but funnels to one lane as cars turn to the rear of the building. There is also a concern about parking and pedestrian traffic.

Huffman said it’s not a matter of the number of parking spaces, rather it’s the location of those spaces.

“No one’s going to park by the movie theater [at the northwest part of the center], then walk [to the new building]…I think you’re going to have to use a lot of the parking in front of Nudy’s and on the other side of the golf place…when this is up and humming, when El Gran Rodeo is humming, you’re not going to have enough places for people to park in the proximity of where they all want to be,” Huffman said.

Engineer John Grant, engineer with Santec, acknowledged the concern and said he’s been talking with township engineer Mike Schneider to work out that issue.

The drive-thru is another matter. Huffman mentioned that since no tenants are lined up yet, it isn’t known if the tenant on the far right of the new building (closest to Route 1) would want a drive-thru.

There is also a concern about the two lanes for the drive-thru merging into one lane, as well as the fact the plans only show one way in and out of the shops. There’s no rear exit.

 With no action taken the applicant will be going back to the Planning Commission in another month or two.