Unity supervisors weigh zoning request for proposed school bus terminal at airport

Unity supervisors are expected in August to rule on zoning approval sought for a proposed school bus terminal at Arnold Palmer Regional Airport.

Earlier in July, the Westmoreland County Airport Authority provisionally approved a 5-year agreement with DMJ Transportation, for storing 30 buses and other smaller vehicles next to the airport’s public safety building along Route 981. The vehicles are used to transport students at Greater Latrobe School District, which inked a five-year contract with DMJ beginning in July 2020.

Authority Solicitor Dan Hewitt and Executive Director Gabe Monzo testified before the supervisors this week in support of the bus terminal, which requires approval as a conditional use in the township’s international airpark district.

A site plan for the terminal shows outdoor storage for up to 40 buses and 40 personal vehicles of the bus drivers on an existing gravel lot. Hewitt said some additional gravel may need to be applied, but it would not require an update of the stormwater management plan for the involved 2-acre section of the more than 1,000-acre airport.

Courtesy of Westmoreland County Airport Authority

This proposed site plan shows parking areas for up to 40 school buses and drivers’ 40 personal vehicles to the right of the public safety building at Arnold Palmer Regional Airport — as seen from Route 981, at bottom, in Unity.

Monzo said the gravel rests on a shale base, so he doesn’t expect the site would be a source of mud tracked onto Route 981.

The authority intends to seek a highway occupancy permit from PennDOT, to have the buses exit and enter directly onto Route 981, Hewitt said. As an alternative, the buses could be routed behind the public safety building to access the highway via Kilo Lane, a private road on airport property.

The site plan calls for a proposed propane fueling station for the buses, which Hewitt said would be under the management of DMJ.

Norvelt-based DMJ recently received a State Alternative Fuel Incentive Grant of $300,000, to reimburse a portion of its purchase of 34 propane-fueled school buses for Greater Latrobe routes.

Under the agreement with the authority, DMJ would pay monthly rates of $2,500 for bus parking and $240 for use of an office desk in the public safety building.

Monzo said the school buses would add to the resources available at the airport and could be used to transport a large number of people from the runway in the event of an emergency.

He said normal bus traffic at the site likely would occur between 6 and 8 a.m. and again between 2:30 and 3 p.m. on days when school is in session.

The authority is seeking a waiver from usual township requirements for landscaping and paving. Hewitt explained paving of the terminal lot isn’t intended since it won’t be open to the public.

Also, he said, the authority is “requesting no landscaping because it’s something the (Federal Aviation Administration) does not favor. We don’t want to attract birds and other wildlife to the airport property and have those be any more of an issue than they already are.”

Unity Solicitor Gary Falatovich upheld Hewitt’s request to strike the testimony of Todd Frescura, a Unity dairy farmer and a driver for A.J. Myers & Sons, a rival bus company that previously had the Greater Latrobe contract.

Hewitt argued that Frescura had no standing to testify in the proceeding, and Falatovich concurred after Frescura indicated his home on Kemerer Road is 3 miles from the proposed terminal and would not be affected.