For the second consecutive time, the Allendale Township Board has tabled plans for new off-campus housing for Grand Valley State University students on the northwest corner of 52nd Street and Pierce Street.

Township Board supervisor Jerry Alkema said several residents from the surrounding neighborhood next to the land planned for the housing were concerned about the noise and density of this development, including concerns of security, fencing and planting.

“In any type of land use change, the neighboring property can be affected,” he said. “The change from low to high density brings more traffic and may not benefit the surrounding property. We will do what we can to make a cohesive neighborhood.”

C&E Infrastructure project manager Jeff Vos said the contracting company in charge of designing and building the new housing is in the process of revising its plans to include landscaping with trees and fencing, in addition to putting a notification in the leases relative to noise and security enforcement. The plans for the housing currently include two-story townhome-like buildings which will have four bedrooms and four bathrooms in Allsward Terrace community.

“What we have is a project that is very apparent that it is intended to be student housing, and you need a transition from student housing to people who are raising their families, especially young families,” Vos said. “The transition is a sensitive issue, and it’s got to be dealt with in such a way that you could put the two different uses close to each other without them having a negative impact on each other. And the township board is sensitive to that. That’s why we are trying to mitigate the problems associated with putting those two uses that close to each other.”

Melissa Holbrook, who lives in the Windfield Drive neighborhood located next to the planned housing site, said her biggest concern with the new housing is the student traffic that 52nd street accumulates and how that will impact her family’s safety.

“We had a cop riding on our son’s bus just last week because cars pass the bus, and it is always college kids,” she said. “Last year, we had the bus and my neighbor follow a car because she passed the bus and flipped us off.”

Holbrook said she hopes there will be a traffic light put up there to reduce the student traffic accidents that occur nearby.

“They use the street as a drag strip,” she said. “I’ve seen them race side-by-side, and a motorcycle doing wheelies, and its college kids. You see them come from (GVSU). You know the average person isn’t going to take their friend on a motorcycle doing a wheelie.”

She said her neighbor was recently in a three-car accident between two college students and she’s lost count of the number of people who have been pulled over on 52nd street.

“We’ve got to protect our kids,” Holbrook said.

The next Township Board meeting will be Monday, April 25, and it is still up in the air as to whether or not the plans will be approved or tabled again.

“Predicting outcomes on voting is difficult, and I try to stay away from it,” Alkema said. “‘Will the plans ever be approved?’ goes along with the difficulty of changing zoning that is not consistent with approved land use. Caution is often time-consuming and this project has been looked at carefully.”

Vos said he’s hoping the changes they are making to their plans will please the board at the next meeting. The current timeline calls for the housing to be finished is in December, but Vos said the actual finish date will be decided once all the plans are approved.

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