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New Home Depot store
reneges on agreement
May 17, 2007
edition
New Home Depot store
reneges on agreement
By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer
Home Depot may be one of the most
popular corporate brands going these
days, but the building supply retailer’s
newest local store is not winning many
fans among its immediate neighbors.
A little over a
month after the international mega-chain
opened shop at the Leo Mall in Somerton,
residents of nearby Hendrix Street say
that the store is causing excessive
traffic, noise and safety problems.
Meanwhile, a city councilman claims that
the store is violating a city ordinance
with the configuration of its parking
lot.
"How in a place
like this can you put a Home Depot?"
asked Jacob Gurevich, a 28-year resident
of the area. "It shouldn’t be." Gurevich
was one of a half-dozen Hendrix Street
residents to meet with the Northeast
Times last week to discuss their
ongoing problems. The homeowners noted
that the store also impacts people on
adjacent streets including Hendrix
Terrace, Barlow Street, Centennial
Square West and Centennial Square North.
They think that
Home Depot isn’t taking necessary steps
to prevent the aforementioned problems
and is reneging on assurances that its
developers gave to neighbors at the
outset of the project in January 2006.
In a written reply
to a reporter’s inquiry about the store,
Home Depot’s corporate office stated
that the store has tried to be a good
neighbor and that it has met all of the
city’s zoning requirements.
The main point of
contention is a parking lot entrance on
Hendrix Street south of Hendrix Terrace.
Under the prior
configuration of the shopping center,
the 30-foot-wide curb cut provided
access to the rear of a Kmart store. But
it was little more than a rarely used
emergency entrance, neighbors say, as
the Kmart faced away from Hendrix
Street. Furthermore, a high wall on the
edge of the commercial property obscured
the rear of the Kmart from view.
But for the Home
Depot project, developers demolished the
old Kmart and erected a new building,
which they essentially rotated 90
degrees to face busy Bustleton Avenue.
Now, the Hendrix
Street parking lot entrance is the
closest one to the store’s main doors,
as well as a separate staging area where
private building contractors pick up
supplies. Motorists can pull into the
lot from Hendrix Street and continue
straight along the front of the store.
Meanwhile, a
replacement wall along Hendrix Street is
only a few feet high, so as not to
obscure the store from view.
"Before, it was
like a dead street. Now, it’s an active
street," said Hendrix Street resident
Ilona Igolkin.
"To (pull out) from
our driveway is very dangerous, and
(drivers) speed," said neighbor Ellen
Gneusheva, who believes traffic volume
on Hendrix Street has tripled since the
store opened.
The store is open
Monday to Saturday from 6 a.m. to 10
p.m. It’s open on Sunday, too.
"(Trucks) come all
the time — morning and night," Igolkin
said.
In January 2006,
before construction on the store began,
project officials advised the Somerton
Civic Association of the planned
configuration. They assured residents at
an SCA meeting that the Hendrix entrance
would be off-limits to truck traffic.
The first signs of
trouble appeared months later when
construction began, neighbors say.
Construction vehicles routinely used the
residential street to access the
building site. In fact, a sign affixed
to a temporary fence surrounding the
site explicitly instructed all
construction vehicles to use Hendrix
Street, not Bustleton Avenue.
During the
five-month building process, Gneusheva
asked for more details about the plans,
particularly the parking lot entrance
across from her home, but got little
information from those on the site.
"I went to them every week and said,
‘Please tell me,’" Gneusheva said.
"They told us a
month before they opened (that) it was
not going to be a driveway, and now it
is a driveway," Igolkin added.
"This street is
unbelievable. It wasn’t supposed to be
like that."
One afternoon last
week, a Times reporter saw two
tractor-trailers leave the store via the
Hendrix Street curb cut in a 10-minute
span.
Home Depot’s
corporate office acknowledges that the
store agreed to keep big rigs off of
Hendrix Street and that it will instruct
truckers to use Bustleton Avenue in the
future.
"We are calling all
of our shipping companies and directing
their drivers to use the Bustleton
Avenue entrance for large deliveries,"
the company stated. "Once they pull onto
our property, all drivers will be
reminded again to make sure they enter
and exit using the Bustleton Avenue
entrance."
Neighbors want to
see the Hendrix entrance closed
altogether, except perhaps for emergency
vehicles. City Councilman Brian O’Neill
agrees.
In fact, in March —
with the opening of the new store
looming — O’Neill introduced and
convinced Council to
pass an ordinance
prohibiting parking lot entrances to
certain large shopping centers from
being within 60 feet of any residential
property.
The Hendrix Street
entrance at Leo Mall is less than 60
feet from nearby homes.
The measure passed
council unanimously on March 15 and was
signed into law by Mayor John Street on
March 29.
In a May 2 letter
to the Philadelphia Department of
Streets, O’Neill noted that the new
ordinance has not been enforced at Home
Depot. Meanwhile, in a letter the same
day to Home Depot’s corporate office,
O’Neill reported
neighbor complaints about noise and long
hours at the store.
In its written
response to the Times, Home Depot
noted that "a city representative from
the Street Department [sic] said there
was no reason to close the Hendrix
Street entrance."
During a City
Council committee hearing on O’Neill’s
ordinance on Feb. 28, a streets
department official testified against
the bill, citing its unknown impact on
other shopping centers throughout the
city. The committee passed the bill
anyway. O’Neill later amended the bill
to restrict its scope to the city’s
largest shopping centers.
Neighbors like Ola
Senkevich and her daughter, Kristina
Senkevich, have lived near Leo Mall for
years but never before had so many
problems.
"It’s ridiculous
what’s going on," Kristina Senkevich
said. "The other day, I go to walk my
dog and — it’s crazy — a car is coming
out of the parking lot going fifty
(miles per hour).
"The reason we
bought a house in the area was because
it was so nice and quiet," she added.
"There’s an
accident at Bustleton and Hendrix every
week," Gurevich added.
Many young families
with children live nearby. Igolkin’s
6-year-old son doesn’t get to play
outside anymore.
"Forget it," the
mother said. "I don’t let him go
outside. Before, I would let him go on a
bike, but he’s young. I’m afraid he’s
going to go under a car."
••
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at
215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com
© Northeast
Times
http://www.northeasttimes.com/2007/0517/homedepot.html
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