Town planning board to review proposal for 7-Eleven on Nassau Street

The town planning board is expected to review a controversial proposal on Thursdayto open a 7-Eleven convenience store at the vacant West Coast Video property.

The town council voted 4-3 in December to pass an ordinance requiring businesses bordering residential zones to be closed between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m., which would cause a problem for 7-Eleven, which is an international chain of convenience store that is typically open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Under the new ordinance, 7-Eleven would be required to revise or retract its proposal.

Other local businesses that want to remain open between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m. must obtain special permission from the town for a maximum totalof six nights per year.

“For example, if the Garden Theater were going to show a very late night screening, then they would need to get an exception," Princeton Mayor Liz Lempert explained. "Also Hoagie Haven, during Reunions, they stay open later so under the ordinance they are allowed to get an exception."

Discussions regarding the new policy began in June with the intention of maintaining “quality of life."

"The issue has been a concern for years in several neighborhoods throughout town," Lee Solow, the town planning director, said.

But the ordinance has attracted some criticism from local business owners.

“I don’t think it’s the problem these neighbors make it out to be. It just seems to me to be completely unfair,” Richard Ryan, owner of the Ivy Inn, said. "If you’re going to allow it for one, you allow it for all. And all these different exceptions they’ve created with these different zones, it just seems to me like it’s unfair.”

However, Lempert said some criticism of the ordinance was incorrect.

“The ordinance does not change anyone’s hours at all because there are no businesses in the area impacted by the ordinance that are open past 2 a.m.," she said.

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Rupert Haas, who lives behind the vacant West Coast Video property, said he did not support the proposal for a 7-Eleven and believed it would detract from the town’s character.

Ryan, however,said that he could see the practical use of having a 7-Eleven at the proposed location.

“I see [the ordinance] as being an inconvenience for people who get up in the middle of the night who don’t want to drive all the way across town to the Wawa for a quart of milk for their kid or a box of Benadryl,” he said. “Long story short, in my opinion, they were jumping the gun in creating a solution by law for a problem that really didn’t exist.”