Upper Dublin: The Making of a 21st Century Suburb ← All Chapters

Nimby-not Inm My Backyard

Impact of (and resistance to) residential developers, such as Sal Paone (Washington Manor, etc.); Westrum; Toll Bros. (Dublin Meadows, Dublin Hunt, and two new senior communities along northern part of Dreshertown Rd. at Welsh: Regency (replacing Zieger Florals’ flower farm, after plan to merge Dreshertown Rd and Dresher Rd. had been scrapped to save the farm that suffered from tariff-free import of roses from Columbia) and Enclave at the Promenade)), and BET-Dublin Terrace (replacing Selas) and Promenade; Goodman; Dublin Meadows, etc.

Development of the St. Mary’s site (preserving Lindenwold Castle, built for Ambler’s asbestos magnate in 1900 but then transferred to Sisters of the Holy Redeemer in the 1930s and provided education for orphaned children), noting two wide release motion pictures were filmed in part at St. Mary’s in the 50s (“The Trouble with Angels”) and 60s (“Where Angels Go Trouble Follows”) (exterior only); and after its educational functions ended and then property was abandoned, to Lindenwold Residential Associates LLC

Commercial developments: transformation of Welsh Rd. corridor, from home for convalescent Jewish seniors home to Prudential Campus100 to BET ownership; BET and the Promenade at Upper Dublin; the three strip shopping centers, George’s founding and evolution; Friendly’s demise; the Fort Washington Office Park Association; professional firms of longstanding, such as Timoney Knox; sale of water system to North Wales in 1979 (and thereafter to Aqua—with PFAS issues arising in 2015?); sale of sewer system to Bucks County Water & Sewer Authority; and 2022 rerating of its capacity permitting residential developments in the Ft. Washington Office Park to proceed; impact of Upper Dublin Municipal Authority. (created 2016)

The Office Park conceived by the Seltzer brothers (through Seltzer Development Corp.’s acquisition of farms and a nursery in Dresher developed by Thomas Meehan, one of the first renowned nursery developers in the United States101 and their 1955 beginning of the then named Ft. Washington Industrial Park, acquisition of Turnpike frontage and existing –maybe abandoned, farms, to present, see Philadelphia Inquirer, March 5, 2018, Business section C1, The Past Is Now, describing that evolution, with the present name Fort Washington Office Park no longer descriptive of its emerging mixed-use character.102

The newer type of owner/tenant in Ft. Washington Office Park: TruMark (2016?); Local 542, Operating Engineers (1999); Lifetime Fitness (2016?); the residential buildings under construction and one seeking approval.

Notes

  1. 100.Act on Zoning Change for Prudential Site OKed by Upper Dublin, Phila. Inquirer, May 13, 1969, p.73;.Prudential Will Build Near Phila., Patriot-News, March 18, 1970, p. 6.
  2. 101.(Oberle, S. G. The influence of Thomas Meehan on horticulture in the United States. University of Delaware, M. S. Thesis Dissertation (Semantic Scholar, May 1,1997), cited in Anthony Aiello, Thomas Meehan: The Horticultural Popularizer, 78 Arnoldia, Issue 5 (Nov. 16, 2021) (identifying Meehan’s’ nurseries, including one in Dresher), and History of Twin Spring Farm in website of Twin Spring Farm School, citing Meehan’s involvement])
  3. 102.Rosenblatt v. Pa. Turnpike Commission, 398 Pa. 111,157 A.2d (1959), describes the history of the Seltzers’ acquisition of the Upper Dublin property at issue in 1949 and the subsequent condemnation of some of that property by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission in 1952 for the Delaware River extension of the Turnpike through Upper Dublin. Another condemnation action, Robert E. Brown v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 399 Pa. 156 (1960), involved a taking (apparently for Route 309) by the Commonwealth of 6.88 acres in Upper Dublin of a nursery property totaling 33.494 acres in Upper Dublin and 19.704 acres in Lower Gwynedd purchased by Brown in 1953.