Cranberry making plans for next stage of growth
CRANBERRY TWP — As some communities are just beginning to establish plans for development, Cranberry is already looking to the future with redevelopment.
This month's Manager's Coffee and Conversation focused on redevelopment in the township.
Jerry Andree, township manager, and other township and community officials led the discussion about redevelopment and what the township can do to keep the community viable for years to come.
Lack of public transportation, difficulty finding workers, keeping neighborhoods kept up and safe and traffic came up as concerns with people attending the event. More than 50 residents and business leaders were at the meeting.
Chelsea Puff, manager of business and economic development with the township, laid out the state of the township before taking questions from the crowd.
“We're doing really well, but we want to do better,” Puff said.
She said the population has grown by more than 107 percent since 1990 when Cranberry began tracking that information closely. The township also maintains a high median income and home value, but the housing stock is diverse.
During the day the population of the township flips with most people working in Cranberry coming from Allegheny and Beaver counties and most Cranberry residents working in and around Pittsburgh. There are about 24,000 jobs in the township, making it a regional employment hub.
The lack of public transportation, however, is affecting the job market in the township. Michael Hall, owner of General Rental, said he struggles to find workers because of the lack of public transportation in the area. He said he hires people from temp agencies, many of them college students, but he loses much of his workforce after the summer while he's still in the busy season.
Puff said they hear about the shortage of workers often from the restaurant and hotel sector, but they don't have a good solution yet that would not burden taxpayers.
“I would say our hands are tied, but we struggle with what we can as a township,” she said, without passing the buck on to the residents.
Puff also revealed responses to a three-question redevelopment poll taken by 200 people.
One question asked what land uses would people like to see the township promote as part of redevelopment. Overwhelmingly the top response was entertainment and arts. People also wrote in responses to say they wanted more mom-and-pop stores and fewer chain stores.
While people said they'd like more mom-and-pop stores, Taco Bell, Trader Joe's and Bath and Body Works came up as the top businesses people would like to see open in the township, Puff said.
Richard Donley, a developer with Chaska Property Advisors, said the township needs to look at making it easier for restaurants to put in drive-through lanes. Drive-through lanes are not just for fast food restaurants anymore, he said.
Although blight is often thought of as an urban issue, Andree said there are pockets of it in residential neighborhoods around the township. He said they are working with the code enforcement department to be more assertive about enforcement to keep home values up everywhere.
Ron Henshaw, director of planning and development services, said people with concerns can take it to their homeowners associations about creating more robust rules for their communities and also enforcing the rules.
“We need HOAs to do their jobs, and they need the backing of the township,” he said.
Traffic in any growing community is an issue, especially for one so closely connected with two interstate highways, Andree said. He said he doesn't mind traffic because it means the community is thriving.
Henshaw said Cranberry would not see another north-south route through the township like Route 19, but officials are trying to connect parallel roads and improve access roads to complete the grid. For example, a new apartment complex development on Brandt Drive is going to connect Route 19 to Executive Drive.
