Monday, January 20, 2003
The city has been getting requests to rezone parcels of land.
HERMITAGE, Pa. -- City commissioners plan to hire a Pittsburgh consulting engineering company to help draft the wording of regulations for a new "mixed-use" zoning district north of Lamor Road.
Gannett Fleming Inc. would be paid $11,700 for its services, if the commissioners vote to hire the company Wednesday.
Most of the area in question is zoned as a planned technical park, but that type of development never occurred, and the land remains vacant.
Zoning proposal
The Pa. Route 18 North Corridor Study, which the city did in 2001 as the state embarked on a $15 million widening project for a 2.6-mile stretch of Route 18, proposed that the land be rezoned as a transitional business district, which would allow multipurpose commercial development.
City Manager Gary Hinkson said the city has been receiving rezoning requests for some of that land, as well as other property in the Lamor Road-Route 18 area, but the commissioners have been refusing to consider the requests until a mixed-use zoning district ordinance is in place.
He said Gannett Fleming helped the city with the Route 18 North Corridor Study and is familiar with the results. That will enable the consultants to move quickly on developing language for that ordinance, he said.
Hinkson said the most recent rezoning inquiry came from the D'Onofrio family, members of which own the land north of D'Onofrio Food Center.
They are interested in rezoning 12 acres north of the store, but the commissioners said that will have to await the drafting of the zoning ordinance, he said.