Rezoning for Cherry Lane warehouse projects at planning board postponed until February; annexation requests postponed until March city council meeting
The developer of two large warehouse projects along Cherry Lane on the edge of Graham and the Hawfields-area industrial park has requested postponements of several items associated with the multi-million dollar projects.
The developer is planning a 825,000 square foot warehouse on about 82 acres at the corner of Governor Scott Farm Road and a 400,000 square foot warehouse on a 38-acre tract, both along Cherry Lane, which has heretofore been a residential area.
The city council had been scheduled to consider annexation of the two sites at its meeting Tuesday night (January 11), but the developer’s attorney, Amanda Hodierne of Greensboro, has asked that it be delayed.
At the city council meeting, it was noted that the request for rezoning, which would be postponed until the planning board’s February 15 meeting, would therefore mean postponing the city council’s consideraton of the annexation until the March 8 city council meeting.
Meanwhile, the developer’s representative has also asked for a postponement for the rezoning requests associated with the two projects on the same properties that were postponed by the planning board’s meeting on December 21.
Those will, instead, be revisited at the planning board’s February meeting, on February 15, rather than January 17.
Concerns were raised at the planning board’s December 21 meeting that the projects were “squeezed” onto the properties without adequate buffers, particularly along Cherry Lane. Both projects front the Old Fields residential subdivision, and neighbors were out in force that night to protest the proposed projects.
The developer is apparently considering how he might revise the siting of the plants so that they would not be so close to Cherry Lane, and how he might provide greater buffers, possibly in the form of a berm, as well as vegetation (instead of just vegetation), to shield the neighbors from having to view the warehouses.
Neighbors expressed concerns about the tractor-trailer traffic from the two projects, as well as having to see the tall, 50-foot buildings from the road.
While some neighbors were opposed to the warehouse projects in their entirety, others recognized that something would be coming and focused on how to tweak the projects to make them more palatable.
See earlier coverage of the projects here:
Dec. 23 edition: After five-hour meeting, rezoning consideration postponed at Graham planning board’s Dec. 21 meeting: https://alamancenews.com/breaking-overnight-proposed-warehouses-for-cherry-lane-postponed-until-january/
Dec. 16 edition: Plans outlined for two large warehouse projects along Cherry Lane: https://alamancenews.com/huge-warehouse-project-proposed-for-graham-along-cherry-lane-in-new-area-of-hawfields-industrial-park/
