Elias Market Can Expand, Commonwealth Court Rules

Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court has ruled that the Elias Farmers Market on Linden Street can expand to add a 5,000-square-foot warehouse and three new loading docks.

The ruling, issued Friday, upholds multiple decisions made by the city’s Zoning Hearing Board and the Northampton County Court of Common Pleas.

It is unclear at this point whether residential neighbors who brought the appeal to Commonwealth Court will appeal yet again to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, though even if they did, there is no guarantee that court would agree to hear the case.

Thus, the latest court ruling may finally bring to an end a four-year fight over whether the market at 3131 Linden St., at the corner of Johnston Drive, can expand.

In its opinion, Commonwealth Court ruled that the record from zoning hearings established that the proposed expansion would not negatively affect the surrounding neighborhood, as the appealing neighbors suggested.

“The nonconforming use existed on the lot … before the establishment of the adjacent residential dwellings,” the opinion said.

“Elias Market is not proposing to increase the size of the store to attract more customers. The proposed expansion will enable Elias Market to buy goods in bulk, thereby reducing the number of deliveries made to the store.”

In hearings, opposing neighbors complained about the noise coming from ventilation units running at all hours and noise and fumes coming from trucks that idle on site frequently.

They argued the situation would be worsened with three loading docks, but the court agreed with the zoning hearing board that these situations should actually improve.

Neighbors also argued that the store had already grown beyond its legal limit because it is a nonconforming use in a rural residential zone that had already quadrupled in size since it opened.

The city's zoning law prohibits buildings with grandfathered nonconforming uses from expanding by more than 50 percent over the life of their use and only with a special exception.

The court ruled that only a dimensional variance was necessary.

“The proposed loading dock, ramp and warehouse will increase the size, extent and scope of the nonconforming use but will not create a new principle use on the lot,” the court opinion said.

“Those structures are incidental and secondary to the principle nonconforming use of the property as a farmers' market/grocery store and constitute accessory structures. They will improve and modernize the existing structures devoted to the nonconforming use and provide needed storage spaces for that use.”