Warehouses can’t be built at Green Grove Gardens event center location
Popular event venue hasn't fulfilled the dream of its founders
Shawn HardyA developer’s application to build two warehouses at the site of Green Grove Gardens event center was turned down Tuesday, April 25, by Antrim Township supervisors.
Manekin, a Maryland-based developer, filed a conditional use application in March to construct two warehouses at 1032 Buchanan Trail East, Greencastle, in the community commercial zone where the event center is currently located.
Supervisors denied the application 4-0 on the recommendation of the planning commission because Manekin did not provide specific information required for a conditional use under the township regulations.
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Testimony on behalf of Manekin at a conditional use hearing and the vote to deny the request came before an overflow crowd of people who filled the 40 seats, stood along the walls and sat on the floor of the meeting room and spilled out into the hallway and foyer.
During the testimony, they learned that although Green Grove Gardens is a popular local venue for weddings, proms, business meetings and other events, it has not lived up to the dream of its founders.
In separate action later in the night, supervisors voted to amend the zoning code to prevent any warehouses from being built in community commercial zones. Warehouses will still be allowed in industrial and highway commercial zones.
Green Grove Gardens is in a community commercial zone running from east of Sheetz at Grindstone Hill Road through Shady Grove to the township line, except for Manitowoc crane manufacturing, which is zoned industrial.
Removing warehouses as a conditional use in community commercial zones had been discussed for years. After supervisors gave Sylvia House, township zoning and code enforcement officer, the go-ahead to prepare the zoning amendment, House advised Manekin representatives they would need to file their conditional use application before supervisors voted on the change, and both issues were on the agenda April 25.
What did Manekin want to do?
Manekin was founded in the Baltimore area in 1946 by two brothers. It is active in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia, with residential, retail, office and, more recently, warehouse development, according to John Graham, a partner with the company who testified at the hearing.
The company wanted to build two spec warehouses of 230,000 square feet each “to accommodate the smaller guy,” according to R. Lee Royer of R. Lee Royer and Associates of Waynesboro, who added, “The huge ones have cut out the smaller guy.”
A slide presentation indicated only three properties with vacancies for smaller, multi-tenant buildings along Interstate 81 from Hagerstown to Mechanicsburg, where many of the warehouses are 500,000 to 1 million or more square feet, one-user distribution centers.
Graham said potential uses at the Buchanan Trail East site included parts, dry goods, cold storage, food, technology, assembly, shipping and retail showroom.
Constructed with glass doors and windows, and designed to be flexible, the buildings could be divided into segments of 30,000 to 40,000 square feet for multiple tenants.
“The market needs these smaller buildings,” Graham said.
The presentation included a trip generation comparison between the existing Green Grove Gardens and the proposed flex space, but not a full traffic study.
Graham said there would be some tractor-trailers, but more straight trucks and sprinter vans, as well as the vehicles of an estimated 300 employees.
Why was the application denied?
Supervisors and the members of the planning commission only heard testimony on behalf of Manekin before recessing the hearing and going into executive sessions.
When the meeting resumed, Chairman Larry Eberly said the planning commission recommended denying the conditional use application because criteria in the ordinance had not been met. Supervisors agreed and after their vote, Solicitor John Lisko explained specific information needs to be provided as outlined in the ordinance.
The ordinance says the applicant must provide detailed written information, including:
- The nature of on-site activities and operations and types of material involved.
- General scale of the operation, including market area, floor space for each activity and number of employees on each shift.
- Any environmental impacts, such as noise, dust and smoke and ways to mitigate them.
- Expected traffic impact, including number of trips, types of vehicles and effect on existing traffic volumes on nearby roads and intersections.
Briefly interviewed after the vote, Graham said the specific information is not available because the proposed warehouses are spec buildings and exact uses and impacts are known.
Why didn’t anyone else testify?
No one in the audience wanted to testify in favor of the warehouse project, but many had been sworn in in case they wanted to speak against it or ask questions.
The hearing never reached that point since the decision to deny the application came after just the Manekin testimony.
If the warehouses had met the criteria, people could have testified about the health, safety and welfare impact, Lisko explained.
Several supervisors remarked on the number of people in attendance and thanked them for attending.
“Your voices were heard even though you did not get to use them,” said Fred Young.
Kris Eddy, a former resident of the Greencastle area who now lives in Waynesboro and still frequently travels Pa. 16, made her thoughts seen.
She tailored the words of folk singer Joni’s Mitchell’s song “Big Yellow Taxi,” which says “They paved paradise, put up a parking lot … Don’t know what you got til it’s gone” to suit the situation, substituting “warehouse” for “parking lot” and, at one point “Antrim Township” for “paradise.”
She had one copy pinned to her back as she sat in the front row.
“I don’t think the warehousing situation has been thought through for our communities,” she said before the meeting began.
What’s going on with Green Grove Gardens?
Had Manekin’s plan had been approved, Green Grove would have remained open while the warehouses moved through the development process, according to Craig McCleaf, whose father, the late Mearl McCleaf, founded Green Grove Gardens more than two decades ago with Jerry Martin.
The future of the location will now have to be evaluated in light of the action at the meeting.
McCleaf testified about the business at the hearing and also spoke with the Echo Pilot while it was in recess and, briefly, after the meeting.
He said his father and Martin had a dream and built an event center where people could attend Christian concerts and “hear the word of the Lord.”
“It really hasn’t materialized to what these gentlemen’s dreams were,” Royer testified. He said a lot of traffic was expected and the facility has a medium-volume highway permit from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation for 1,600 to 5,000 trips per day.
Green Grove Gardens can hold up to 1,000 people and McCleaf said his father wanted to “bring in 80 to 100 jobs … that hasn’t happened.”
There aren’t enough concert ticket sales to pay for the venue, but Green Grove Gardens did a good business for weddings — its “bread and butter” — and other events.
However, he pointed out Green Grove was built to Antrim Township’s strict infrastructure standards. When other event centers sprang up in nearby municipalities with fewer restrictions, Green Grove had to lower its prices to remain competitive.
To be a success, the facility has to be used five nights a week and not just on weekends, he said.
Out of respect for Mearl McCleaf and Jerry Martin, who was at the hearing, but declined to speak with the Echo Pilot, Green Grove has stayed with the tradition of Christian music.
“If the warehouse doesn’t happen, we can’t continue without more events,” McCleaf said.
There is interest in the property for other kinds of music, such as country and rock ‘n’ roll, McCleaf said.
Shawn Hardy is a reporter with Gannett's Franklin County newspapers in south-central Pennsylvania — the Echo Pilot in Greencastle, The Record Herald in Waynesboro and the Public Opinion in Chambersburg. She has more than 35 years of journalism experience. Reach her at shardy@gannett.com