Developer Plans 55-Plus Community In Solebury

A Montgomery County-based developer wants to build a 55-plus rental community on a 20-acre tract in Solebury Township.

Heritage Senior Living, which is developing The Birches at New Hope senior living complex nearby, seeks to construct apartments and cottages under the name “Fountainhead at Solebury” along West Bridge Street.

The community would be connected by a roadway to The Birches at New Hope. The first residents are expected to move in to The Birches at New Hope later this year.

Kevin McCollum, Heritage Senior Living CEO and a Solebury Township resident, and Michael McCormick, the company’s director of development, presented the plans to the Solebury Township Zoning Hearing Board earlier this month.

The proposed development, which is located between West Bridge Street, the Aquetong Creek, and PECO transmission lines property, would include 18 single-story cottages, 52 luxury apartments in four buildings with underground parking, and 90 smaller apartments.

Plans also call for a clubhouse and pool at the site.

The community would have 388 parking spaces.

McCollum said the community is designed to help seniors downsize from full-sized houses.

Heritage Senior Living officials said they are still determining project costs.

The zoning board approved the developer’s variance requests.

The plans will have to come before the Solebury Township Board of Supervisors.

The property has a history of development. In the mid-1950s, author James Michener and Sylvan Pools founder Herman Silverman developed it as an aquatic club. It later became a bar and restaurant before closing. In the late 1960s, a businessman purchased the property and turned it into the Fountainhead banquet facility, which was destroyed by a fire in 1999, according to past reporting from the now defunct New Hope Gazette.

Previous development attempts for the property were unsuccessful.

Advertisement