Moving Firm’s Warehouse Approved For Barnabas Rd

By Andrew Gorosko

The Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) has approved a moving firm’s plans to construct an almost 20,000-square-foot warehouse on an industrial site on Barnabas Road in Hawleyville.

P&Z members January 25 unanimously approved applicant KIM Properties, LLC’s proposal to construct a 19,764-square-foot building, parking area, and driveway at 46 Barnabas Road for Braun Moving, Inc.’s moving and storage business. The site is in an M-1 Industrial zone. The owner of record of the site is Allen Real Estate Enterprises.

The site provides the moving firm with easy access to the Exit 9 interchange of Interstate 84.

The warehouse will be built on Lot 9 of the Hawleyville Industrial Park, the last lot which remains in the linear industrial area that runs along the northern side of Barnabas Road. The 14.4-acre lot is just west of P&G Sanitation’s 13,500-square-foot garbage truck garage. The P&Z approved the garbage truck garage in October 1997.

Whether motorists passing by the moving firm’s warehouse will even realize it is there is unclear, in that the P&Z is requiring that the applicant leave in place a substantial wooded buffer that exists along the property’s frontage on Barnabas Road.

P&Z members decided that the construction application which was approved January 25 is a good proposal, which significantly improves on previous versions of warehouse development plans that had been submitted for their review.

Initial plans had been drafted November 7, with revisions submitted January 4 and January 10.

In approving the plans, P&Z members placed some conditions on the project.

The P&Z required that the applicant pave and curb a turnaround area on the northern side of the warehouse. The applicant earlier had proposed that the turnaround be covered with gravel.

Also, a wooded area along Barnabas Road at the property’s frontage must remain in place.

The P&Z is allowing the warehouse to have a height equivalent to that of a two-story building.

More than 75,000 square feet of the lot will be covered with impervious surfaces. A stormwater detention basin will be constructed to the rear of the warehouse to regulate drainage flowing off the site after storms.

The town health department has determined the septic system for the building can serve a maximum 15 employees. A fire sprinkler system will be installed for fire protection.

The building will have ground dimensions of 162 by 122 feet. About 18,117 square feet of area will be designated as a warehouse, with the remaining 1,647 square feet used as an office area.

Parking will be provided for 28 automobiles and 20 trailers.

In reviewing development plans for the site, Conservation Official C. Stephen Driver noted that the warehouse construction project represents fewer disturbances to wetland areas than development plans which were proposed for the site in 1992 but were never implemented.