READING., Pa. – The Reading Zoning Hearing Board voted favorably Wednesday to grant zoning relief for developer Alan Shuman’s proposed 156,000-square-foot shopping center in the city.
The 19.3-acre lot at 1853 N. Third St. is the site of the former Glidden paint factory which closed in 2007.
The factory buildings have since been razed.
The vacant property is bounded by Bern Street, Richmond Street and Rockland Street, and is situated between Centre Avenue (Route 61) and the North Fifth Street Highway (Route 222.)
Anoread LLC is the owner of record of the property, which is under agreement of sale to Glidden Development LP.
The site is in the M-C Manufacturing Commercial zoning district, which makes the proposed use permitted through a special exception. The zoning relief granted also includes variances from off-street parking requirements and loading dock requirement.
Last month at the hearing, Shuman said he has already successfully developed three other neighborhood shopping centers in the city over the last 15 years.
Shuman is seeking to develop his fourth shopping center on the southern 13 acres of property in question.
The city zoning ordinance would require 800 parking spaces for the size of the development, but Shuman’s plans call for 500.
Shuman previously testified that the zoning officer has the authority to do a 50% reduction waiver of the parking if the tenants are similar uses. The waiver has been given to Shuman at his other city shopping centers.
The second zoning issue involved the designation of loading spaces.
Shuman identified the loading areas are in the upper lefthand corner of the plan because the tenant configuration has not yet been laid out.
Shuman had asked for zoning approval with a condition that when the land development plan is finalized, there would be a requirement that there be several loading spaces in that area.
Although it has zoning approval, the project will need to undergo a comprehensive land development plan review by the city planning commission.
Residential parking lots
The board also rendered decisions on two requests from the Reading Parking Authority for several variances for proposed residential parking lots on Mulberry Street and on North Ninth Street.
The variances were requested because the projects exceed the percentage of impervious coverage, and because there is a need to eliminate the requirements for screening, clear sight triangles, parking lot setbacks from existing dwellings and the requirements for landscaping in a buffer strip, and to reduce the dimensional requirements for handicapped parking spaces.
The board denied the appeal for the lots proposed on Mulberry Street, but approved the appeal for the lots on North Ninth Street.
The board did not give any reasons why it denied one appeal but approved the other.
Crispy chicken franchise
In new appeals, the board heard requests from:
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Harnoor Properties LLC, 1014 North 13th St., for a special exception to expand the use of a non-conforming gas station/convenience store to include a crispy chicken franchise, which the applicant contends will be a no-impact business to what is already there.
As an alternative to the special exception, the applicant asked for consideration of a variance from permitted uses in the R-3 Residential zoning district.
A decision will be given on Sept. 11.
