The proposed Gettysburg Station Project will be very bad news for residents living north of the main building (tower), which is planned to be 72 feet high by about 130 ft wide (East to West). Two government subsidized apartment buildings devoted to people of low income, including seniors and disabled persons, lie immediately north of this tower. These are the Gettysburg Interfaith Apartments and the Harold Court Apartments. If the Project is realized, the fate of the residents in the 72 apartments in these buildings is to be shadowed from the sun for much of the day during winter, when the sun only rises low in the southern sky. Most of Harold Court will see no sun at all during peak daylight hours of 10:00 to 2:00 in the winter months, when sunlight is already scarce. Interfaith will begin to see the sun blocked from about noon onward. Residents will not see a sunset for most of the winter.
This will have consequences we must seriously consider before letting the Station Project go forward. For example, a resident of Harold Court writes the following on the Save Historic Gettysburg Facebook page, in response to a comment by a fellow Gettysburg resident on the shadowing and its detrimental effects:
“YES! THIS IS MY GREATEST FEAR, living at Harold Court. I am so disgusted with Gettysburg… And thank you for your kind concerns! Due to my medical issues, I was very thankful to have an end unit which allows me to have a total of 3 windows (2 are doubles). They will no longer be useful… I also have 2 loving cats who sun bathe regularly… They are my Emotional Support Animals so if they become depressed due to lack of sunlight, it’s gonna drastically affect me….”
Stories like this will be a very sad and ironic outcome of this unnecessary new development. Sad, obviously, for the residents, and deeply ironic in that the Project has found the support of many in the past because of a supposed low income fraction of apartments. It turns out that the developer appears to have no intention of including any such housing. His website clearly states that all apartments will be offered “at market rate.”
The Land Use Plan for the Project is now before the Planning Commission for analysis. As stated on the Borough Website, “The Commission protects the health, safety, and welfare of Borough residents, and provides leadership in the management of growth and change of the economy, ecology, and environment of Gettysburg.” Given this directive, it could not be more clear what the Commission’s responsibility is in the current situation. These neighbors and friends have already experienced challenges in life beyond what many of us will ever have to face. Will we take away their sunshine too?
The time has come. Let us put an end to this ill-planned and ill-conceived aberration on the historic and human landscape of Gettysburg.