Proposed South Fayette storage facility hits speed bump

A self storage business looking to build a facility in South Fayette Township hit a roadblock at a public hearing before the board of commissioners July 18 meeting.
Guardian Self Storage submitted a conditional use application to build a four-story, 27,000-square-foot storage facility at the old Kings Restaurant lot at 3049 Washington Pike.
Patrick Cooper, project engineer from Gateway, requested the board allow five “modifications” to the conditional use application, as the self storage facility met only 15 of the 20 requirements for the application.
“We think these 20 conditions were written in a different time of self storage development,” Cooper said. “Self storage used to be these one-story, metal buildings with garage doors all around them. The 21st century self storage is not. It’s now compact, very expensive buildings, and garage doors aren’t around the bottom.”
Of the five requirements that the application doesn’t meet, the most notable is the minimum site requirement of four acres, as Guardian Self Storage needs only 1.3 acres.
The other requirements pertain to the height of the building, the ingress and egress, the usage of HVAC units and fencing around the property.
Cooper pulled the conditional use application after township solicitor Robert Garvin told him the board would not consider the five “modifications,” as legally they are considered “variances” that would need to be approved by the zoning hearing board.
“There’s no provision in our ordinance to grant waivers or modification,” Garvin said. “Your choice was to come to the township for conditional use…but this is something for the zoning hearing board.”
Cooper said Guardian Self Storage is a benefit to the community in the two ways South Fayette residents are often concerned: taxes and traffic. He said the tax revenue is more than double that of a restaurant in the same location, and a self storage facility would not bring more traffic to the area, compared to a restaurant.
“What self storage does for this site is it brings in more tax revenue than any other type of commercial use,” he said. “So it would be a great thing for the township for tax revenue, and it generates almost no traffic. Every meeting I’m here, people are talking about the traffic on Washington Pike and this wouldn’t add to that, and the tax revenue would be two-to-three times higher than what else could go here.”
Cooper said to the commissioners that he was looking for reassurance about the future of the project. He didn’t want to take the conditional use variances, he said, to the zoning hearing board to then be rejected by the commissioners a month later.
“If we’re going to be shot down, I’d like to know the answer tonight,” Cooper said.
The board didn’t provide an answer.

Photo courtesy of Digioia Gray & Associates
Photo courtesy of Digioia Gray & Associates
Depicted here with red dots are the six abandoned oil and gas wells in South Fayette.
Also during the meeting, Erich Zorn, a senior geologist from Digioia Gray & Associates, presented to the board about orphan and abandoned oil wells in South Fayette.
Zorn explained a grant program through the state Department of Community and Economic Development. The Orphan or Abandoned Well Plugging Program aims to fill the half a million oil and gas wells in the commonwealth.
Zorn said there are at least six wells in South Fayette, and the grant is for $250,000 per every two or three wells. Digioia would aid the township through the process, if the board chose to hire the company, construction and search of other abandoned wells.
The board tabled the motion for next month.