Rendering of the proposed Madison Parking Lot redevelopment project, as presented by Equus Capital Partners to Lansdale Parking Authority, March 13 2013. Courtesy of Lansdale borough.
LANSDALE — A week after the public got its first look at updated plans for redevelopment, including a skate park toward the rear of the Madison Parking Lot, the borough is seeking more grant money to help with that project.
On Wednesday night, council voted unanimously to apply for $700,000 in state grant funding that council vice president Mary Fuller said will come with no cost to the borough.
“There is a match portion — a 50 percent match — but I’m pleased to announce that the developer will pay the match so it’s a total win-win for us,” Fuller said.
Last week that developer, Equus Capital Partners (formerly known as BPG Properties) publicly displayed its latest plans to redevelop the borough’s Madison Parking Lot, with a skate park and pedestrian overpass added to the project’s initial intent of building a parking garage, apartments and retail space atop the current lot and vacant fields behind.
One of those fields, located below the water tower near Third Street and Richardson Avenue, would become the future site of a skate park for a community Fuller said was “ecstatic” to learn of the new plans.
“I’m getting well-verbalized, well-thought-out emails from people who understand what this means, are excited about it, and want to be involved in it. They can’t wait to help,” she said.
Those offers have ranged from volunteers to host skateboarding lessons to assisting with the development process, and Fuller said “these are people from all ages, from their 40s and 50s down into the 30s, 20s and teens.”
Borough officials hope all of those users stay involved as the project moves through the land development approval process, and Fuller said that buy-in will help create a desire for the skate community to take care of that park.
“If they’re invested in the process, if they’re users, then you can be damn sure they’re going to keep (the park) clean and neat, and be on the lookout for others who may want to damage or vandalize or graffiti,” she said.
The grant money would come from the state’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, as part of its Community Conservation Partnerships Program (C2P2) meant to encourage green park projects, trail connection and outdoor recreation — which the skate park and trails promote.
“You can walk there on the trail, you can skateboard to it on the trail, you can drive you can walk, you can take the train to it,” Fuller said.
That trail connection will help connect Hatfield and Upper Gwynedd connections with downtown Lansdale. Upon its completion, Fuller said, Lansdale will be the first municipality in the county to finish its stretch of the Liberty Bell Trail, which will run from Stony Creek Park at Hancock Street, along the railroad tracks past the Andale Green development, into downtown past the borough municipal complex and through the Madison lot to connect with Hatfield west of Third Street.
Fuller and borough Manager Timi Kirchner both emphasized that the grant funding would be used for public improvements on land that would be owned by Equus but used by the public, such as the trails and the skate park.
“There have been questions about whether or not the rants are going for the developer’s benefit, and that’s simply not the case,” Kirchner said..
“The grants are for a trail, for a skate park, and for improvements on Madison Street. These are all public areas, that will remain (public), once this project is up and running and spectacularly successful,” she said.
Several other council members thanked to the team of borough officials and consultants that helped prepare and present the plans last week. The officials included councilman Dan Dunigan, who chairs the borough Parking Authority, which agreed to sell the lot to Equus.
“I’ve looked at the numbers dozens and dozens of times and it’s still, frankly, staggering” to see the total benefit to the borough the project will bring, he said.
Borough fact sheets available at the council meeting show maps of the project and its relationship to other projects under active development in Lansdale, and a Parking Authority fact sheet details the projected $748,000 in annual revenue and $965,000 in one-time revenue the project should create.
The project has already been awarded $2.5 million in state grant money to assist with other public improvements and Equus and the Parking Authority submitted further grant applications last month seeking $800,000 more for remediation work on that property.
Long term benefits to the borough total over $20 million when the costs of the nearby SEPTA garage and pedestrian bridge are included, and Dunigan encouraged the public to attend a special Parking Authority meeting on March 27 when that entity could approve the latest plans.
“That will be the jumping-off point, where the folks from Equus can head for the subdivision and land planning phases and we can get this ball rolling,” he said.
