Future site for hotels, restaurant in Cherry Hill? Looking east on Route 70, the Magic Car Wash and the now-empty gasoline station. The property goes beyond the station.
The drawing shows placement of the proposed hotels and restaurant. The Magic Car Wash would be to the left of the restaurant, and not in this drawing.
One of two hotels KM Hotels proposes to build at 2348 Route 70 West in Cherry Hill, just before Cuthbert Boulevard. This one faces Route 70.
When Cherry Hill police arrived at the mostly undeveloped, wooded 11 acres on Route 70 in January 1991, they found 75-year-old Peter Voschin tied to a telephone pole, frozen to death. He was sitting, bound with rope and cable and a cloth over his head, according to news reports at the time.
That homicide of one of the two brothers who since the 1940s ran a salvage yard and stone business on the site has never been solved. Brothers Peter and Stephen, 76 at the time, lived on the land together in a corrugated metal shack heated by a wood-burning stove and raised vegetables to live on.Â
While many may not recall the tale, commuters might recognize the site just east of Cuthbert Boulevard across from the Crowne Plaza hotel for other reasons: it once held a miniature golf course overseen by a giant stone dinosaur, a landscaping stone supply firm, a now-closed vintage gasoline station and the Magic Car Wash, which has remained open.
It's a storied piece of property. A second suspicious death occurred in 1996 when a 41-year-old homeless man apparently drowned in a 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.
Now it appears the land, which sold for $2.75 million in 2011, may join the development boom along Route 70.
KM Hotels LLC (CH Development Partners LLC) has applied to the township Zoning Board of Adjustment for permission to build two hotels — 251 rooms total — and a small restaurant. The car wash would remain on the site.
The zoning board had been scheduled to consider KM Hotel's application this Thursday, April 16 at a videostreamed meeting but the agenda, posted late Tuesday morning, says this application and others have been postponed indefinitely.
Although the Richmond, Virginia-based developer — which operates top brand hotels such as Marriott, Hilton and Wyndham mostly in the south — doesn't name the hotels in its application, the company website says one would be a Hampton Inn & Suites and the other a Residence Inn. KM Hotels was formed in 2013 and is owned by Mayur and Keyur Patel.
Details of KM Hotels' plans were disclosed in 2,002 pages of its application and supporting documentation recently provided to 70and73.com after an Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request with the township.
A traffic study submitted by the developer (download a PDF version of the report here) maintained the "development will have a minimal impact on the adjacent roadway network." The study projects the hotels and restaurant will generate 172 new trips during the AM peak hour, 194 during the PM peak hour and 254 during the Saturday peak hour.
The back of the property at 2348 Route 70 West is wooded, with a stream that's a tributary to the Cooper River. A 150-foot by 125-foot lot facing Route 70 in the middle of the property, which held a now-razed Cottman Transmission, is owned by Cooper Health System and is not part of the project.
Under the KM Hotels application, the developer proposes subdividing Lot 2 into two parcels. One six-acre lot would be used for the hotels and restaurant. The second lot of five acres would be redeveloped with a renovated car wash and a coffee shop, according to documentation with the application. However, plans for the car wash lot are not part of this application.
Environmental reports on the site account for a large part of the application to the zoning board. The report states the site has seven underground gasoline storage tanks from the gasoline station. Chemicals have leaked into the soil and the site must be cleaned up, according to the application. However, the remediation "has been delayed due to the former service station operator and property owner both denying responsibility for the investigation and clean up," the application states.
The site with the unusual history today has some dirt roads scratched out of the mostly wooded area. Bob and Maureen Lee had operated Lee Stone Supply on the site after they befriended Stephen Voschin, who left the property to the Lees. Maureen Lee of Marlton sold the property to Route 70 West LLC in November 2011, according to state property records.Â
