Landscaper to move to Levittown Parkway, past the bend and near churches. Here's the plan

Despite concerns it will change the character of a residential stretch of the Levittown Parkway, Bristol Township Council gave approval to a landscape company to build a storage and staging depot on a hill among churches there.

Elements Landscaping purchased the 1.8-acre wooded lot in the 500 block of the parkway from the Church of Christ. It will be developed as the company’s headquarters, which is locally owned by Larry Fulford, a township resident.

There are concerns that the business, which employs up to 10 people, will complicate a busy stretch of the northbound parkway, Levittown’s main cross-town highway.

Just before it passes the site, the parkway curves, then rises up a hill before leveling out as it ends at New Falls Road, becoming Oxford Valley Road.

“From Tullytown to New Falls Road, it’s churches and houses,” said Councilman Pat Antonello, who lives in the nearby Magnolia Hill section of Levittown. “There’s no other commercial developments on that road, and it doesn’t seem like there’s a need for one on that road.”

Fulford’s lawyer, Bryce H. McGuigan, said Fulford is aware of the concerns and intends to camouflage the site with Green Giant arborvitaes, a fast-growing evergreen that will conceal a 4,000 square foot pole barn where Elements’ equipment will be stored.

“We’re gonna try to make this look nice (and) blend with the community. Right now it’s just a mess of dilapidated trees,” he said. “We’ve had homeless people in there.”

McGuigan said employees will arrive between 6:45 a.m. to 7 a.m. Monday through Friday and sometimes on weekends.

“(They will) load up for the day, leave and be gone until 3:30 to 5 p.m. or so,” he said.

The site is not open to the public.

“There is no work actually performed on the property,” McGuigan said.

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Antonello is also said he wonders if operations on the site will grow beyond what’s been presented to the public.

“I’m concerned that in the future, there will be an attempt to do more things” on the property, he said.

“That’s not gonna happen with Elements,” McGuigan said.

Antonello, a councilman for nine years, said: “I’ve sat in this chair and talked to a number of different business owners who have looked me in the eye and said, no, Pat, this is what I’m gonna do. And later on, down the road, have done something really completely different then what they swore from their mother’s grave they would not do … Pardon me if I’m a little, you know, pessimistic.”

“If he’s doing something here that’s visually offensive, he’s going to hear about it, because you’re gonna hear about it,” McGuigan said.

There is also a concern that slow-moving trucks hauling loaded trailers off the site will surprise motorists who routinely hit the gas as they speed up the Levittown Parkway’s hill. There’s a blind spot where, for a moment, you can’t see what’s coming up the hill as you pull onto the parkway.

McGuigan said the design considers that, which is why it’s set back from the highway by 60 feet, giving Fulford’s employees a broader line of site as they exit the lot.

“When you’re driving up Levittown Parkway, it’s easy to envision driving up to go … through the bend, up the hill and you can see” -- he snapped his fingers – “a truck coming right out from that tree line, and you’re sitting there thinking ‘oh my god.’ That’s not gonna happen,” he told the council.

The council gave its approval, but under certain conditions among them that the planned gravel lot be paved within 365 days of opening.

Fulford has been in business for 16 years, he said. His landscaping and hardscaping services are about 80 percent commercial. One of his clients is Team Toyota on Business Route 1, he said.

JD Mullane can be reached at 215-949-5745 or at jmullane@couriertimes.com.

This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Landscaper to set staging depot among churches on Levittown Parkway