Plan Update Takes 10-Year Look Into The Future Of Newtown Borough

NEWTOWN BOROUGH, PA — The Newtown Borough Planning Commission invites the public to
take a 10 year look into the future during a public meeting on the borough’s proposed updated comprehensive plan.

The meeting will take place on Tuesday, Nov. 15 beginning at 7 p.m. at the Chancellor Center.

The plan acts as a roadmap for the town’s future and covers every aspect of the community, from housing and demographics to walkability and the makeup of the downtown, and makes recommendations for future boards and commissions to consider.

“What this (the updated plan) does is it creates a vision for the next 10 years,” said Mark Craig, chairman of the planning commission.

The commission began updating the plan during COVID, which slowed down the process, “but what we ended up with is a very good and thorough update of our compressive plan,” said Craig.

Looking ahead over the next 10 years, chief among the objectives is to provide a good mix of housing in the borough from low price to high price.

The plan suggests exploring possibilities for providing smaller, more attainable housing options in the borough to help diversify the housing stock. It also recommends updating the borough’s zoning ordinance and subdivision and land development ordinance to continue support of residential adaptive reuse.

“You want people working in the community to be able to live in the community,” said Craig.

“Historic preservation is also important in the borough and it continues to be” over the next 10 years, said Craig.

The plan recommends continuing to protect the integrity of the Newtown Borough Historic District and the district’s National Register status and updating the historic resources survey to determine whether there is potential for expanding the Historic District or additional resources to be nominated to the National Register.

“Looking for the right mix of residential and business within the borough is also important,” added Craig, “because our downtown business district is quite important to the community and it defines, to some extent for those on the outside, what Newtown Borough is.”

The plan recommends the following:

• Providing more outdoor dining and seating opportunities for businesses on State Street and ensure useable public and semi-public space;
• Ensuring a mix of retail stores in keeping with the identity and marketing efforts of the business district;
• Considering special events specifically featuring street closures and expanded outdoor dining; ensuring a mix of uses in the district, including residences and professional offices in spaces above street level; and
• Promoting coordinated improvements at borough gateways, including landscaping, street amenities, pavers, storefronts, and signage.

“One of the things that is becoming more and critical in planning discussions both local and regional is circulation - walkability, trails, safe routes,” said Craig. “We talked about safe routes to Goodnoe. We talked about trail network and connectivity. We also have a lot of concern over the safety of our roads. It’s important that over time we create a network of sidewalks that’s comprehensive throughout the borough. One of the things Newtown Borough prides itself on is being a walkable community.”

The plan recommends the development of an active transportation plan to create a comprehensive vision that incorporates all aspects of the borough’s multi-modal transportation system. Areas of focus include: a formalized complete streets policy that provides design guidelines, preferred traffic calming measures, performance measures and implementation steps that help bring bicycle and pedestrian-friendly systems to fruition; pedestrian circulation that would Identify gaps in the sidewalk system and develop strategies to fill in those gaps; and a trail and bicycle safety plan that can serve as the borough’s formalized trail and bike system plan.

The plan also talks about energy and its effective use and making it easier under borough regulations to adapt technologies as they become practical and allowing for the implementation of more energy efficient building practices.

Craig encourages everyone to come out to the meeting and to hear what’s in the plan and “understand what we felt was important going forward. And if there is something that we missed it will be important to get that input,” he said.

The borough recently approved a public 45 day review period during which time the public has a chance to respond to the recommendations contained in the document and to offer their suggestions.

The plan is the result of a complete review of the borough, its goals, resources, history, and outside forces, culminating in a 10-year plan to take the community forward. The comprehensive plan will serve as a guide to planning initiatives in the Borough as well as updates to its zoning and subdivision and land development ordinances to be consistent with the Borough's vision of the future.

To review the plan prior to the meeting, click here.