I’ve been keeping an eye on Richboro.
For those of you who can’t quite place Richboro, it’s in Northampton Township, Bucks County, just several miles west of Newtown. It’s not quaint like Doylestown or Newtown, or artsy like New Hope, but it’s an old community, and people are fiercely loyal to it.
The big issue these days in Richboro is the building of yet another mega shopping center. This one would be on the former Davis Pontiac site on Second Street Pike, and it’s main tenant would be a 57,500+ square foot Giant supermarket. Right now Richboro has two supermarkets – Shop n’Bag and Superfresh. It’s plain to almost everyone that the community isn’t big enough to support another supermarket, and Giant will end up fighting for a piece of a market share, maybe taking it away from the other two markets, and hurting those centers.
I haven’t done all the research, I admit, and I’m not even a voter in Northampton Township. I also don’t want to get “political” on Bucks County Taste. But I do think this is a prime example of overdevelopment, centering on how we buy our food. It’s come down to a community vs. developer (and local government).
To learn more about what’s been happening, see the article on BucksLocalNews.com about Tuesday night’s gathering when hundreds of local residents filled the school where the Northampton Township Planning Commission met to consider a proposed zoning change at the former Davis Pontiac site.
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Another supermarket???? Seems crazy to me too, Lynn.
As someone who was raised in Richboro and still goes back to shop at Shop N Bag and Tanners? It will be really inconvenient to try to get to the center of town if they put in this new shopping center. The traffic will be horrendous and hurt other businesses along Almshouse, Bustleton and Second Street Pike. I stopped going to Southampton due to heavy traffic jams. I fear the same result for Richboro if they put this center in… In five years, no one will want to go anywhere near Richboro. Let’s hope it never happens…