It always comes full circle to Ardmore, and development worries have landed Ardmore and Cricket Avenue on the Lower Merion Conservancy's 10 Ten Most Endangered List.....again.

Wow. It must be some kind of record if you go through Mike Weilbacher's lists over the years to see how many things Ardmore have landed on the list, and how many things Ardmore have then been lost because by gosh, by golly, every square inch of Ardmore is a development opportunity, isn't it?

Oh yes, the nasty by product of a well intentioned redevelopment plan: all the others who want to ride on the coattails. And yes there is such a thing as the "The Coattail Effect", although it is generally applied to politics, I believe it applicable here as well.

Do we need all this development? In a word "no".

Do we need a Master Plan for Ardmore? In a word "yes".

Does anyone really listen to what anyone concerned about Ardmore has to say? Hard to say, actually. Depends on who you talk to, and when it comes to dealing with government, listening and hearing and acting are all dependent upon who you are talking to because the problem with Ardmore is the problem with dealing with local government: too many visions and not enough common sense at times, right?

Ardmore's largest problem has been competing visions combined with simply not hearing what the residents ask for. And you have to consider that different residents have different wants, needs, and desires.

However, it has always seemed to me that a couple of things the residents agree on as a whole has been the desire for moderation when it comes to development, human scale, historic preservation, answers to parking problems that can't be glossed over and avoided by touting transit oriented development as the sole solution. Residents also express concern over faux affordable housing, because let's face it, most of the time developers only add it to plans so they can maximize their land footprints through incentives, right? It's not for altruistic purity is it?

Cricket Avenue has almost become a target and a battleground. I think that these plans independent of the redevelopment plan will not complement the redevelopment plan, I think they are there to compete with the redevelopment plan, and I fear a saturation point.

I also quite frankly fear the economy. How does anyone know really if a developer is truly financed on a plan completely and irrevocably when a development plan is presented? Which comes first the chicken (plan) or the egg (financing)?

I don't find anything special, for example, with the plan proposed for 11 and 15 E. Athens Ave in Ardmore, which I am including in the Cricket Pile. I see it as too many units, faux affordable, and not enough parking. It's just another piggy plan for Ardmore. I am looking forward to the plan for the Verizon lot because word on the street is that it is a refreshingly NON piggy plan and is something that will complement the redevelopment plan.

I hope a lot of folks take the time to come to the Ardmore Then and Now Event Scheduled for this evening at 7 p.m., because the answers to Ardmore's future have always partially lain with Ardmore's past.

I make no secret of my love for Ardmore. As a child,when I first saw it, it was the town of front porches, and it was Main Street. As an adult, I still see that, but I also see more: I see my friends with their homes and businesses. I see the children who make the neighborhoods come alive with joyful sounds. I see interesting homes that deserve preservation, and yes, I would like to see another historic district in Ardmore, one very a la Cape May that could help protect the Victorian heritage that is so very important to much of the history of Ardmore.

But you know what? I can wish all I want for things, but if people aren't involved in Ardmore's future nothing is going to work. We can't armchair quarterback Ardmore, citizens need to be actively involved - look at the newly minted Merion Community Coalition - they are to be applauded and emulated.

Ardmore is a grand old gal, and if you love her as much as I do, please get involved. If you are tired of dumb plans no matter where you live, get involved. It doesn't happen without you. And trust me, being involved in your community is not a bad thing, it's a good thing.

Now catch up on your required reading for the week courtesy of Main Line Life and Main Line Times and the Suburban and Wayne Times:

Posted on Tue, Sep 16, 2008
Group's list has new look
LM Conservancy releases Preservation Watch List for 2008.
By Cheryl Allison

The Lower Merion Conservancy has released its Preservation Watch List for 2008, and a street in Ardmore that faces change from development has taken the top spot.The conservancy's historic preservation coordinator, Lori Salganicoff, said that in considering possibilities for the 11th annual list, the organization "opened [the process] up a little bit broader" to nominations from the general community.

The two properties at 130 and 106 Cricket Ave., for which development plans have been submitted, were "the most nominated," she said.

When the organization's Historic Preservation Advisory Committee reviewed all the nominations, it placed Cricket Avenue at the top not so much because of specific development plans, however, Salganicoff said, but because the street stands as an example of a threat facing a number of neighborhoods.

The list includes some familiar sites from previous years whose fate is still uncertain, but it also includes several new entries, where loss or significant change are more recently recognized possibilities....In the case of Cricket Avenue, development plans by Cricket Avenue Development Partners, the equitable owners of both parcels, call for demolition of existing buildings and construction of new, larger multifamily residential structures. The property at 130 Cricket is the site of a late 1800s Victorian frame house, while 106 Cricket has housed the Stuard Funeral Directors business since the 1920s. Making use of incentives in the township's zoning code for including affordable or moderate-income units, five-story buildings are proposed at both locations, with condominiums at 130 and rental apartments at 106.

Denied by the zoning hearing board, the 130 Cricket case has been appealed to Montgomery County Common Pleas Court, where a hearing might take place this fall. The board of commissioners approved a tentative sketch plan for 106 Cricket in May.

Posted on Tue, Sep 16, 2008
Developers have plans for LM's 'Main Street'
By Cheryl Allison

To bolster Lancaster Avenue in Ardmore as a vibrant "Main Street" business district, the thinking in Lower Merion Township is that more people should be living in the downtown.That's why it has offered incentives of increased density, greater building height or reduced parking requirements for new development there.

And developers have started to respond. In one several-block area south of Lancaster Avenue, as of this month, no less than four new condominium or apartment projects have been proposed.

The newest of these is a combination project slated for two properties on East Athens Avenue. The township's planning commission reviewed a tentative sketch plan Sept. 8, and recommended approval.

Before the plan went on to the board of commissioners two days later, however, it was tabled for study of a proposed condition of approval. It's expected to come back for board review in October.

The proposals by developers Ballyhaunis Partners LP calls for consolidation of lots at 11 and 15 E. Athens Ave. An existing two-story building at 11 Athens would be demolished and a new five-story condominium building of 33 units would replace it. The existing four-story apartment building next door would be renovated and its 14 units would remain as rentals.

Like proposed new developments at 130 and 106 Cricket Ave., the plan takes the township up on incentives based on the inclusion of affordable or moderate-income housing. The 14 apartments at 15 Athens would be restricted to tenants who meet income guidelines; the new units at 11 Athens would all be market rate units.

Posted on Wed, Sep 17, 2008
Another fix for the preservation ordinance: Protecting our objects
Natural Selections by Mike Weilbacher

Last week, we explored one direction to take Lower Merion's much heralded but improvable historic preservation ordinance: amending the ordinance to not only make it easier for buildings to be added to and removed from the preservation inventory, but easier to move them up and down within the two classes of buildings.

This week, let's tiptoe into another discussion I've been thinking about for a very long time - in fact, ever since the ordinance was first presented, back in 2000.

Let's begin discussing the preservation of important historic objects.

As reported in the news pages of this paper, the Lower Merion Conservancy has just released the 11th annual Preservation Watch List, our annual ranked listing of the area's threatened historic architecture created by a committee of community preservationists that includes architects, historians, professors, realtors and more. Appearing on the list are buildings you'd recognize as important pieces of Lower Merion's history, like Gerhard, the original Bryn Mawr hospital, and Victorian homes in Ardmore proposed for demolition.

Tucked firmly into the list for the last several years have been Lower Merion's street signs.

Posted on Thu, Sep 18, 2008
Transit center supporters hope ‘village green’ soothes skeptics
By Dan Kristie

Community leaders are working on a proposal to help sell the Paoli Transit Center project to neighbors who may be wary of it.

The plan is to make the current Paoli Train Station, which will be demolished after the transit center is built, into a “village green.”

“Downtown Paoli has almost zero green space,” said Ed Auble, a Paoli Business Association member who helped craft the proposal. “If there were a village green, and it were well done, it would be something we could all point to as a Paoli landmark.”

Such a landmark would help the town, known mainly for its train station, develop a new identity, Auble added.

“We’ve even been toying with the idea of having an annual blues fest at the village green,” Auble said.

He acknowledged he may be getting ahead of himself — the village-green proposal is in early stages, and it’s not on any official plans for the Paoli Transit Center.

For now, official plans call for the existing train station to be pulled down and an intermodal transit center to be built 800 feet to its west. This transit center would include a parking garage and stops for local buses and Amtrak and SEPTA trains....To help fund the transit center Amtrak would allow a private developer to build a dense, mixed residential and commercial development on the rest of the rail yard.

Many Paoli residents are unhappy with this proposal.

Suburban and Wayne Letters:

...Lastly, let us not forget that it was in fact anarchists who were the original “community organizers” that were responsible for the American Revolution.

We now refer to them as our nation’s forefathers.

“Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither liberty nor security”

— Benjamin Franklin

Jamie Rapposelli,Wayne