Route 70 West LLC proposes a new car wash on the present site of the Magic Touch Car Wash.
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Two major Cherry Hill "Gateway" development plans on Route 70 that include two five-story hotels, an upscale restaurant, a new car wash and a coffee/doughnut shop on largely unused land just east of Cuthbert Boulevard are scheduled to go to the zoning board on Thursday.
Although the projects were approved in 2020, the projects' developers are asking for new preliminary and final major site plan approvals after they amended their plans after working to secure permissions from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection because the property has a tributary of the Cooper River running through it. The hotel developer also purchased a small lot that previously was surrounded by the project and owned by Cooper University Health Care.
The fully remote Zoning Board of Adjustment meeting starts with a public caucus at 7 p.m., followed by the public meeting at 7:30. Details on joining the Zoom meeting are on the Township website.
Over the decades, parts of the nearly 12 acres have held a landscape supply storage lot and retail garden center, a miniature golf course, a gasoline station, a travel agency and a rental car outlet. The only business now operating is the Magic Touch Car Wash.
The land was the site of a murder in January 1991 of 75-year-old Peter Voschin, who was found tied to a telephone pole, frozen to death, bound with rope and cable and with a cloth over his head.
Voschin and his brother, Stephen Voschin, had operated a salvage yard and stone business on the site since the 1940s. They lived together in a corrugated metal shack on the land that was heated by a wood-burning stove.
Voschin's murder was never solved.
A second suspicious death on the property occurred in 1996 when a 41-year-old homeless man apparently drowned in the stream on the site.
For decades, 2348 Route 70 West was viewed as highly desired by developers but Peter's brother, Stephen, who died in 2007, would not sell the property.
The two hotels, restaurant and car wash with a coffee shop would go on land now occupied by an existing car wash and a long-closed gasoline station. Cuthbert Boulevard is to the left.
Hotels and restaurant plan
KM Hotels LLC of Richmond, Virginia, proposes, according to its application:
- A 131-room Residence Inn by Marriott, which would be parallel to Route 70.
- A 120-room Hampton Inn & Suites, which would be perpendicular to Route 70.
- A 4,250-square-foot, 120-seat "upscale eating establishment" with a full-scale bar area.
A vacant gasoline station on the site would be demolished.
The Township's 2020 resolution authorizing the project had 100 conditions of approval in the resolution, the Township Department of Community Development review letter noted.
KM Hotels' project was being proposed at about the same time that New Jersey in 2020 passed an environmental law affecting 600 miles of rivers in the state including the Cooper River and its tributaries. The river was classified as a Category One waterway, with more restrictive regulations including a buffer zone for the stream on the land of 300 feet, rather than the former 50 feet, the Township letter noted.
"As the applicant was granted their preliminary site plan approval retroactive to March 19, 2020, the NJDEP deemed that the applicant was 'grandfathered' from the impact of the increased width of the riparian zone — which would have impacted the entire development proposal — on the condition that they would not be required to obtain a Flood Hazard Permit," according to the Township letter.
The plan submitted by the applicant to the DEP called for all "hard structures" to be out of the flood-hazard area.
In the review letter, the Township told KM Hotels it needs to identify and catalog all of the trees on the site and disclose the number of healthy trees that will be removed.
The current Magic Touch, or Magic, Car Wash on Route 70 in Cherry Hill.
Car wash and coffee shop plan
A separate project that would go on the subdivided lot would be a car wash replacing the current Magic Touch Car Wash, also called the Magic Car Wash.
The 3,979-square-foot car wash would operate seven days a week, from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday until 5 p.m. A daily average of 75 to 125 cars is expected to go through the wash, according to estimates by the applicant, Route 70 West LLC.
A separate 2,474-square-foot drive-though coffee/doughnut shop would operate seven days a week from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. and seat between 20 and 25 customers, according to the application. The coffee shop, operating to the left of the car wash, would average between 100 and 200 customers daily.
In February, the zoning board did not vote on a developer's proposal to build a four-story self-storage facility at Route 70 and South Union Avenue, which is next to the hotel development site. The developer's lawyer chose not to proceed with a vote when it appeared it would not pass.
Previous 70and73.com coverage
- A homicide, a drowning all part of history of Route 70 site that may get two hotels, restaurant.
- Residence Inn, Hampton Inn developer gets preliminary Cherry Hill approval for Route 70 site.
- Zoning board approves renovated car wash, coffee/doughnut shop on Route 70 in Cherry Hill.
- Residence Inn, Hampton Inn developer gets preliminary Cherry Hill approval for Route 70 site.
- Self-storage facility on Route 70 in Cherry Hill? Zoning board sees it as bad fit for town's gateway.
