{"id":995,"date":"2010-12-08T11:05:12","date_gmt":"2010-12-08T16:05:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unionvilletimes.com\/?p=995"},"modified":"2010-12-08T11:05:12","modified_gmt":"2010-12-08T16:05:12","slug":"gate-lock-at-superfresh-remains-bone-of-contention","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=995","title":{"rendered":"Gate lock at SuperFresh remains bone of contention"},"content":{"rendered":"

Township, property owner sparring over key system, expansion plans on hold<\/span>
\nBy Mike McGann<\/strong>, Editor, UnionvilleTimes.com<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

This is gate is locked during the evening, but concerns exist about emergency access.<\/p><\/div>\n

EAST MARLBOROUGH \u2014 The say good fences make good neighbors, but in the case of the SuperFresh Supermarket, on U.S. 1, it\u2019s a good locked gate \u2014 preventing early morning deliveries and trash pickups behind the store \u2014 that is keeping the neighbors happy.<\/p>\n

But concerns about emergency access to the rear of the store led to some lively discussions during Monday night\u2019s Board of Supervisors meeting, as the owner and manager of the site sought preliminary approval for a minor expansion to the market, located in the Longwood Village Shopping Center.<\/p>\n

The township and the property owners are working to resolve a disagreement about the property \u2014 and matter is currently before the courts, as the property owners are appealing previous township rulings about revising the site development plan.<\/p>\n

Monday night\u2019s discussions were, in part, an attempt to resolve those issues, keep the neighbors happy and allow the supermarket to expand \u2014 the store faces increasing competition from the coming expansion of the nearby WalMart into a full SuperCenter, making it a full competitor to the SuperFresh. The store already faces competition from a Genuardi\u2019s across the street \u2014 although the Safeway-owned chain is struggling and rumors continue to circulate that more store closings \u2014 the chain already closed a number of outlets including the one in Chadds Ford \u2014 are coming in 2011.<\/p>\n

To get that expansion \u2014 the property owners need to satisfy the township on the gate issue.<\/p>\n

Currently, the gate is manually locked by the store manager during non-business hours \u2014 and the manager of store has the key. As part of the proposed expansion, the supervisors wanted an electronic locking system installed, at least on one gate. The property owner, RJ Waters, is proposing using a lock box, similar to those used by real estate agents. While the lock box would cost about $100, the electronic system is priced at $27,000. There is concern about emergency access to the rear of the store \u2014 more on the police side of the issue, rather than fire, as the fire companies would just cut the lock with a bolt cutter.<\/p>\n

The concern, as expressed by township supervisors, is the worry that police officers needing to get out of their cars to open and unlock the gate might provide a hazard \u2014 assuming there is a potential threat behind the store. An electronic system would allow both local and State Police to get access to the rear of the site without getting out of their patrol car.<\/p>\n

Initially, Waters offered a \u201ctrial period\u201d for the lockbox \u2014 and if there were three incidents with either emergency responders or deliveries in a 12-month period, the company would immediately agree to install the electronic system. That didn\u2019t pass muster, as various supervisors including Richard Hicks and Richard Hannum said that while three strikes might be okay on the delivery issue, they would only consider a \u201conce and done\u201d policy on emergency access.<\/p>\n

And even at that, supervisors were not sold.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s only a partial fix,\u201d Hicks said.<\/p>\n

Supervisors deferred a decision on the proposal, suggesting that Waters needed to discuss the issue and get input from township Police Chief Gerald Davis as well as the State Police before the township would be willing to sign off on the lockbox idea.<\/p>\n

Previously, neighbors complained about deliveries and trash pickups behind the store as early as 4:30 a.m. \u2014 in violation of the original approval of the shopping center\u2019s hours of operation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Township, property owner sparring over key system, expansion plans on hold By Mike McGann, Editor, UnionvilleTimes.com EAST MARLBOROUGH \u2014 The say good fences make good neighbors, but in the case of the SuperFresh Supermarket, on U.S. 1, it\u2019s a good locked gate \u2014 preventing early morning deliveries and trash pickups behind the store \u2014 that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":996,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[38,145,146,57,24],"class_list":["post-995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-east-marlborough","tag-longwood-village","tag-superfresh","tag-township-supervisors","tag-unionville"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}