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Cornelius News

Drive-throughs in Town Center zone?

Jan. 18. At their meeting tomorrow night, Cornelius commissioners will consider a change in the town’s zoning law which would permit restaurant drive through facilities in the Town Center zoning district. The Town Center district covers Main Street from Food Lion to Hickory Street and Catawba Avenue from Main Street to Meridian Street. It also includes Antiquity. The meeting was re-scheduled from the Martin Luther King holiday Jan. 18.

In 2014, the Town modified drive-through regulations in the Town Center to permit drive-through facilities for banks and pharmacies. However, they kept the ban on restaurants, fearing that such facilities would change the pedestrian focus of Town Center.

A driving force behind that decision was the hope that a commuter rail line would be soon running through town on the Norfolk Southern tracks. Now that the commuter line appears to be a long shot at best, the town is considering a change to also permit restaurant drive through facilities.

Also at Monday’s meeting, the board will consider allowing electronically changeable copy signs for civic uses only, which would include schools, churches and government. Town law currently limits their use to gas stations only. The meeting begins at 7 pm, in Town Hall on Catawba Avenue.