A representative for the developer called the new CVS "a logical extension" of the commercial development at the adjacent Centerville Square shopping center.
But a nearby Marietta Avenue resident spoke for some of his neighbors when he said the new free-standing CVS "is just going to add more traffic to an already dangerous intersection."
This was the debate generated Wednesday by plans for the new drug store on a 5.5-acre site at the southwest corner of Centerville Road and Marietta Avenue in East Hempfield Township.
The township Planning Commission voted, after a lengthy discussion, to recommend approval of a rezoning that would pave the way for the new CVS.
The planners' 4-2 vote sends the rezoning request to the East Hempfield supervisors, who have the final vote.
The petition to rezone the land was filed by Centerville Development Co. and developer Kevin Lahn, asking to rezone the land from suburban residential (R-1) to community commercial (C-2).
CVS is planning to vacate the Centerville Square shopping center, immediately to the south, and open a 9,000-square-foot free-standing store at the Centerville Road/Marietta Avenue site.
That location now includes a house that township officials said is deteriorating and even an eyesore.
The CVS move "is a logical extension of the C-2 zoning of Centerville Square, moving northward," said Mark Stanley, attorney for the developer.
But planning board member F. James Fullerton said he couldn't help but think that approving the store would be "like the first domino to fall" in terms of incoming development in that area of Centerville.
"Once we convert this to C-2, the door is going to be open, and then it's going to be hard to stop any development," said Fullerton, who voted along with board member Nancy Cooney against supporting the rezoning.
Said the resident who spoke, Don Haines, "The neighborhood looks nice. … It'd be a shame to lose it."
Planning board members Dwight Rohrer, Keith Falco, Daniel Steinbacher and Andrew Weaver supported the rezoning.
Weaver said the new CVS could be used to spur much-needed traffic improvements at the Centerville/Marietta intersection.
Falco, noting this is at least the third development eyed for the site — one of the earlier efforts, never developed, called for a seven-story apartment complex — emphasized that "somehow, this tract is going to get rezoned."
"What I'd hate to see is another 10 years go by, and these houses (now at the site) start to fall," he said.
A tentative sketch plan presented to East Hempfield shows an entrance/exit from both Centerville and Marietta, with another access road behind the store into Centerville Square.
At both, drivers could make a left turn and a right turn into the store and a right turn out, but there would be no left turn out against traffic, officials said.
No hearing date on the rezoning request before the East Hempfield supervisors has been set.
