WEB UPDATE: The Planning Board decided Wednesday to hear further testimony at it’s February meeting on an application to build three warehouses on Davidsons Mill Road.
By: Joseph Harvie
The Planning Board decided Wednesday to hear further testimony at it’s February meeting on an application to build three warehouses on Davidsons Mill Road.
The attorney and the site plan engineer for T.C. South Brunswick Inc., which is proposing to build the complex, and two residents spoke before the meeting was adjourned at 11 p.m. at the request of Planning Board members.
About a dozen residents representing the Eastern Villages Association attended the meeting. EVA is a citizen group made of residents in the eastern section of town, located near the township’s border with East Brunswick and Monroe, near Davidsons Mill, Deans Rhode Hall and Fresh Ponds roads. They have been fighting warehouse development in their section of town for over a year.
T.C. South Brunswick Inc. is proposing to build three warehouses at the intersection of Davidsons Mill Road and Route 535, east of the N.J. Turnpike, totaling 1.8 million square feet on about 113 acres.
According to an application on file in the Planning Department, T.C. South Brunswick Inc. is seeking major subdivision approval to make four lots into one conforming lot, preliminary and final site plan approval with variances to allow more impervious coverage than is allowed, and more parking than is allowed in the front of the complex.
According to the application, a variance will be needed to allow more than 10 percent of the parking to be located in the front yards of the property. The warehouses will have frontage on three roads, Route 535, Davidsons Mill Road and Middlesex County Boulevard.
A waiver also will be needed to allow for loading areas to be placed in the front yards. The developer is also seeking a variance to allow 63 percent of the lot to be covered by impervious surface, when only 60 percent is allowed.
According to a memorandum, the plan calls for the warehouses to be built in three phases.
The first phase would include a 600,000-square-foot warehouse facing Route 535, built on a 34.64-acre parcel. The second phase would include a 95,000-square-foot complex adjacent to the first, located closer to the intersection of Route 535 and Davidsons Mill Road on a 26.7-acre parcel. The third phase would include a 750,000-square-foot warehouse located behind the first two warehouses on a 44.8-acre parcel. The developers also would set aside 7 acres of open space
In a letter from the township’s police Traffic Safety Bureau, police said the applicant should be responsible for making improvements to Davidsons Mill Road because of increased traffic on the road if the warehouses are built.
"Should this facility be built and operated without significant roadway improvements, the facility will have a significant negative impact on the surrounding roadway systems, possibly contributing to unsafe roadway conditions due to the increased volumes," the police memorandum stated.
In addition, if the project is approved, the applicant would be responsible to either build 14 affordable housing units or pay $1,314,942 to the township’s COAH trust fund, which is used to pay for affordable units to be built, according to the application.