1,203 housing units are proposed for one of Montco’s last big open spaces, riling residents

A rolling, 176-acre, unbroken tract of privately held land off Black Rock Road in Upper Providence Township known locally as Parkhouse, looked as if it was topped with whipped cream after a recent snow.

One of the last big chunks of open land in the Royersford area, it overlooks Montgomery County’s glistening Upper Schuylkill Valley Park, a bird lovers’ bliss.

But the current landowner’s plans to develop the Parkhouse property has riled neighbors.

“There’s a value to the township and to the public” of keeping the land undeveloped, Bill Felton, 70, said as he looked over the parcel. “It’s not just our local area that would benefit from this being saved. The region would benefit.”

Township officials hired Natural Lands, a large conservation nonprofit, to assess the site. Natural Lands issued a report last year calling the tract “one of the last large undeveloped lands along the Schuylkill corridor in Montgomery County.”

In addition to being adjacent to Upper Schuylkill Valley Park, the parcel is near the Upper Providence Township Trail and across the river from the Phoenixville boat launch, Black Rock Dam, and the Black Rock Sanctuary. It contains two streams and seven seeps and springs.

Natural Lands cataloged 65 acres as a “highest-priority conservation area” and urged the township to preserve it.

Montgomery County once owned the land and the Parkhouse Nursing & Rehabilitation Center, which was named after former county commissioner Russell Parkhouse. The county acquired the land in 1801.

But in 2014, the county — under Josh Shapiro, who was then the chair of the county board of commissioners and is now Pennsylvania’s governor — sold the Parkhouse complex and its surrounding land for $41 million to Mid-Atlantic Healthcare, which was led by CEO and physician Scott Rifkin until 2017.

At the time, residents objected to the sale, saying they believed the land should have been saved as open space.

The sale came after officials said the nursing facility was running a deficit estimated at more than $1 million a year. The county also used money from the Parkhouse sale and that of another property to pay down debt and plug holes in the general fund. One reason county’s budget had taken a hit: A developer’s plan to convert an old shopping center in Norristown into a movie studio failed. The county, before Shapiro’s election as chair of the commissioners, had invested $24.5 million in that redevelopment project.

Today, the land is split. Bedrock Care now owns the still-operating Parkhouse Nursing & Rehabilitation Center and its roughly 40 acres of grounds. And Maryland-based Royersford Holdings LLC owns the surrounding 176 acres that residents are fighting to preserve.

Royersford Holdings submitted a plan in 2022 to build 1,203 units for a residential senior-care facility for people 62 and older. Plans called for a mix of single-family homes, townhouses, multifamily units, apartments, and assisted-living units offering different levels of care.

The township’s zoning map shows the tract as “open space,” but that’s a leftover designation from when the county still owned it, say township officials, who note that open space is not a zoning type that applies to private land. The land already had other zoning through what’s known as an overlay.

The overlay allows for development related to government, nonprofit, and other private institutional purposes such as nursing, convalescent, residential care, or assisted living for seniors.

The Royersford Holdings plan fits in with that use under township zoning. But, under the zoning code, the project also requires the approval of the board of supervisors, who will assess whether it meets all the conditions of the code.

Because of the recent proposal to build on it, the tract became a hot local political issue in the township. Residents created a website and social media accounts. They started a petition and GoFundMe page, saying they fear development will hurt the environment, create traffic, and burden emergency responders and police.

Township officials say they don’t have the money to purchase the property, which is appraised at $49 million.

As a compromise, township solicitor Joseph Bresnan submitted an ordinance in November for the board of supervisors to consider allowing Royersford Holdings to build 689 townhouses, far fewer than the original proposal. But, under the ordinance, the company would no longer have to limit sales to those 62 and over in need of assistance.

But angry residents showed up in force at the board’s January meeting and offered hours of testimony against the ordinance. They believed the developer really did not want to build the residential care facility and preferred the unrestricted housing.

The board, siding with residents, voted against the ordinance. Bresnan, however, said that despite residents’ hopes, it’s unlikely the land would remain as open space, given its zoning.

Ed Mullin, an attorney representing Royersford Holdings, said his client was away and unavailable for comment.

Township officials say Royersford Holdings has notified them the original plans for 1,203 units are back on. The board of supervisors is expected to place the Parkhouse property on its Feb. 20 agenda.

Residents, like Susan Denby, are planning to turn out against the plan.

“It’s a beautiful vista. It adds a lot of quality of life,” Denby said. “We’ve got to stop the madness. Why are developers in the driver’s seat of how townships get developed, how Pennsylvania gets developed?”