Doylestown Supervisors Approve Plan to Widen Rogers Road

If plans for other developments in the area were firmer, Doylestown Township Supervisors might have made a different decision about how to handle the widening of Rogers Road.

But with the only certain construction project of Temple Judea, a two-story, 20,000-square-foot synagogue that is already underway, the board opted to solve a small piece of a complicated puzzle.

Board members voted unanimously Tuesday night to direct Temple Judea to widen Rogers Road in front of its property by about eight feet and leave the rest of the improvements to occur when future developments are approved. It will also install curbing and draining, along with a traffic signal at York Road.

That's exactly the way Temple Judea planned it and the way the township approved it in 2009. But with the possibility of two other developments coming to the area, and residents complaining about the possibility of more cars traveling through their neighborhood, the board asked its traffic engineer to come up with a comprehensive plan to address the entire stretch of Rogers Road from Spring Valley Road to York Road.

Turns out there was just too much uncertainty to accomplish that goal at one time.

Phil Wursta, a traffic engineer for Pennoni Associates, laid out several scenarios for the board to consider. One called for widening the entire length of Rogers Road from 24 feet to 36 feet to create three 12-foot lanes -- one in each direction, plus a center turning lane. Another option called for widening the road to create two 14-foot lanes or two 12-foot lanes with a two-foot shoulder.

One plan outlined by Wursta called for creating a visual archway that would signal the transition from an industrial area to a residential neighborhood. Another called for creating traffic calming measures such as curb extensions, chicanes, and speed humps, to discourage speeding.

But who would pay for what and when the work could be be completed were questions left unanswered. With Temple Judea "strongly preferring to start now" on the road project, according to Wursta, the board chose to stick with the approved plan.

Temple Judea will widen Rogers Road an additional eight feet, creating a wider lane along its approximately 500 feet of frontage. Additional improvements will be made as future developments are approved, said board chair Barbara Lyons.

As part of its development plan, the synagogue agreed to pay for a traffic signal at York and Rogers roads. But the plan does not call for widening the intersection.

Resident Joe O'Malley asked the board to consider the implications of leaving the intersection of Rogers and York roads unimproved. School buses can't make the turn because of the tight radius, he said. Some resort to cutting through private property to access the neighborhood, he said.

"It's important that you make this safe," he said. "I don't think this plan is safe."

The future home of the reform synagogue is being built on eight acres of land at Rogers and York roads. The temple broke ground on the new site on Dec. 18.