A Jenkintown developer wants to turn the Bluestone Country Club golf course in Blue Bell into a neighborhood of more than 140 homes, filing what Whitpain Township supervisors called the largest land development proposal the township has seen in 30 years.
BSK Meadows Realty Partners LP submitted a conditional use application on Aug. 5 to build 104 single-family homes and townhomes on the nearly 130-acre property at 711 Boehms Church Road, according to township records posted online. Around Ambler first reported details of the application. The existing clubhouse and event space would remain.
But the developer immediately hit the brakes. Attorney Christen G. Pionzio of Hamburg, Rubin, Mullin, Maxwell & Lupin filed an indefinite waiver alongside the application, asking the township not to schedule a hearing or begin any substantive review.
"We ask that this application be accepted and filed but not processed any further by way of substantive review by Township staff, consultants or any boards, committees or commissions," Pionzio wrote in the Aug. 5 cover letter to township code enforcement officer Travis DeCaro.
The township cannot act until BSK Meadows lifts that waiver. Once it does, supervisors have 60 days to schedule a public hearing.
What's proposed
The application calls for 104 single-family detached homes on the larger portion of the property, which falls in the R-1 zoning district. A smaller section zoned R-3B would hold townhomes. The conditional use plan was prepared by Kennedy & Associates and dated July 29.
The exact townhome count is unclear. The application form lists 38 units for the R-3B district, while the supervisors' Aug. 18 public letter references 30 townhomes. The discrepancy has not been publicly explained.
The property and the buyer
The site was formerly Meadowlands Country Club, founded in 1949 and later renamed Bluestone. BSK Meadows Realty Partners LP purchased it from Green Acre Realty Co. in May 2016 for $4,797,000, according to the deed recorded with the Montgomery County Recorder of Deeds.
BSK Meadows is an entity associated with Bruce Goodman, founder and CEO of Goodman Properties. The Jenkintown-based firm, established in 1985, has developed more than 5 million square feet of commercial, residential and office space across the Delaware Valley, though it is best known for retail projects including CVS, Walgreens and Wawa locations.
Goodman Properties did not respond to a request for comment.
Supervisors' response
The five-member Board of Supervisors, chaired by Scott M. Badami, issued a public letter on Aug. 18 acknowledging the filing. The board said the proposal is "not a 'done deal'" and noted the township has "tools to limit unchecked and/or unwarranted development plans," while acknowledging "some restrictions on our ability to prohibit all development at Bluestone if the owner of the property chooses to continue in this direction."
The letter flagged several intersections that will require traffic review: Boehms Church Road/Plymouth Road/Penllyn-Blue Bell Pike, Boehms Church and School Roads, Morris and School Roads, and Plymouth and Morris Roads.
Supervisors also cautioned that "development plans of this nature go through various iterations" and that the submitted plan may not be the final version the board reviews.
What happens next
No hearing date is set. Under Pennsylvania's Municipalities Planning Code, the application would go to the township planning commission for a recommendation before the Board of Supervisors holds a public hearing and votes to approve or deny the conditional use. When a hearing is eventually scheduled, adjacent property owners will receive mailed notice and the hearing will be advertised in the Times Herald.
