BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Leaders at First Presbyterian Church in Bethlehem shared a first look Wednesday at possible directions for a planned mixed-income residential development on the church’s Center Street campus.
The church and its planning consultant, Chicago-based firm Collabo, shared three preliminary drafts of what a housing development there could look like, based on community input gathered through a survey and previous community meeting.
The three site plans debuted Wednesday range in size from 220 to 320 housing units, with 400 to 540 parking spaces. They preserve 31% to 44% of the campus’s open space.
All three site plans include a mix of two-story twin homes, two-story townhomes, and two- to four-story apartment buildings.
Surrounding the residences, the draft plans call for new walking trails and amenities, including a small amount of commercial space.
Each has a slightly different design philosophy and different priorities.
Details of the plans
The least-dense plan, Eco-first villages, includes 220 units of housing and emphasizes “sustainability and regeneration,” according to materials from the church.
Housing is in four clusters along the edges of the church property, with larger apartment buildings in the back.
Concept B, The heart of home, includes 260 units of housing laid out to create “a traditional neighborhood feel.” The design focuses around First Presbyterian’s existing memorial garden and adds new walking trails nearby.
The third design, Embracing community, keeps most of the church lot’s frontage along Center Street unchanged and fills in 320 housing units around the other three edges of the property.
Apartment buildings east of the church form a college-quad-like courtyard.
“If you think of this project as a marathon, this is like the 100 yard line. We're building up some steam, but there's a long way to go.”First Presbyterian pastor The Rev. J.C. Austin
A new survey from the church, open through Feb. 29, will collect feedback on the three draft plans from the community.
Those responses will be used to merge well-liked aspects of the three concepts into a single site plan, set to be the subject of another community meeting in April.
First Presbyterian embarked on the housing project late last year as a way to use its resources to ease Bethlehem’s housing shortage while generating revenue to support its operations.
Once a vision for the site is finalized, the project still will need to work through the city’s lengthy land development and rezoning processes.
“If you think of this project as a marathon, this is like the 100 yard line,” First Presbyterian pastor The Rev. J.C. Austin said. “We're building up some steam, but there's a long way to go.”
‘Always thought they were pulling something’
While many in attendance Wednesday, especially church members, spoke positively of the housing project, a group of First Presbyterian’s neighbors have voiced opposition.
Tina Bradford, who lives near the church, listed many familiar worries associated with new development: increased runoff from more impervious coverage, increased traffic from new residents and overall strain on existing infrastructure.
Bradford also said she was worried so much low-income housing would be bad for the neighborhood, and that dense residential development generally wasn’t compatible with the area.
“I think there's other solutions — and also to start smaller.”Bethlehem resident Tina Bradford
“We’re worried that [new residents] are not going to be really part of the neighborhood," she said. "There are houses right over here that cost millions of dollars.
“I think there's other solutions — and also to start smaller.”
Overall, Bradford, like other of First Presbyterian’s neighbors with reservations about the housing project, said she simply didn’t trust the church’s motives.
“Why are they doing this? I don’t get it,” she said. “There’s a lot of mistrust… I always thought they were pulling something.”
‘It's what God's telling us to do'
Austin replied, “I think some people are saying, ‘You're really in this for the money.’ And the answer to that is, if we we're in this for the money we wouldn't be doing mixed-income housing.”
From the beginning of the project, Austin and his colleagues at First Presbyterian have cast the effort as a way to achieve the mission of helping neighbors by attenuating the city of Bethlehem’s housing crisis using unused space, while also generating revenue for the small congregation in the process.
“There's a level of skepticism that I think is understandable, in that, 'Why would you sort of go to all this trouble?' The truth is, we're going to all this trouble because we think it's what God is telling us to do. And Christians have done a lot crazier things than this on the basis of that.”First Presbyterian pastor The Rev. J.C. Austin
To that end, leaders at First Presbyterian have taken a community-focused approach to determining what the additions to the campus will ultimately be.
As a result, Austin said, almost everything about the project is still up in the air.
Bradford, like other residents living near First Presbyterian, flatly rejected the idea community input will determine what is ultimately built on the church campus.
“There's a level of skepticism that I think is understandable, in that, 'Why would you sort of go to all this trouble?'” Austin said.
“The truth is, we're going to all this trouble because we think it's what God is telling us to do. And Christians have done a lot crazier things than this on the basis of that.”
