Some Springdale residents are planning to gather Saturday morning to protest a data center development planned in the borough.
The group will congregate from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. near the fork of Pittsburgh Street and Lincoln Avenue, near From Italy Pizza, according to Tom Bailey, one of the protest organizers.
Bailey and around a dozen others have been regularly meeting at the pizzeria to discuss continued resistance to the project, which is planned for the former site of the coal-fired Cheswick Generating Station.
The proposal met fierce resistance from some residents during the conditional-use process late last year, though borough officials ultimately approved the center. They cited fears of a doomed legal battle if they attempted to block it.
“I think there’s quite an appetite to stand up,” Bailey said.
He said the protest will be peaceful, and the group has no intention of blocking traffic.
After the protest concludes, Bailey said, protesters and interested locals will gather inside From Italy to discuss strategies to halt the project during its upcoming land division hearings — which are yet to be scheduled.
Bailey said he’s unsure what sort of numbers to expect at the protest, but he hopes the gathering at the pizzeria will get more residents involved in resisting the project.
“A lot of people in Springdale think this is a done deal; we don’t think it is,” he said.
Toni Robbins, a former borough councilwoman who lost her seat in last year’s election, also is involved in the group.
She said the informal group is developing legal strategies to intervene in the upcoming hearings.
“Show up with your signs,” Robbins said. “Lend your support.”
It won’t be the first time the proposal has generated protests in Springdale.
Residents gathered several times last year, though those protests mostly took place near the proposed site of the center and outside the Springdale borough building.
