the property line that says William Street. A passerby, a member of the general public, would certainly think that is a public right-of-way, but in fact, again, that portion has been vacated. And again, the right-of-way does exist in the back portion of this property. The existing access road that goes from West Commodore back to Diana is currently used by the current operation on the site and used by the adjacent business on Lot 40. The existing building on site is going to remain. The back portion of the site for quite some time has been used as outside storage for some of the businesses that occupy the site. There are two businesses occupying the site currently. One is owned by their client, the applicant, is a concrete business. He has an office in a front portion of the building and he was using the back part of the building for storage of various materials for that business. Then he has a granite countertop business in there as well who uses the back portion of the existing building and they have some outdoor storage of granite slabs and such on the premises. This application is proposing to remove those outdoor storage activities, bring this plan way more into compliance with ordinance requirements, keep the existing building, propose a new warehouse building and provide the required parking and other improvements in accordance with ordinance requirements.
Mr. Macfarlane asked if there were any questions about William Street and the vacation. Dr. Campbell liked the way it was explained which came first, the chicken or the egg. She asked if they get this Board approval, then will they still have to go and get something done with this street that does not really exist. Mr. Macfarlane replied that they would like to vacate the right-of-way. This front piece was vacated by Committee by ordinance in 2004. In 2004 it was a Committee, not the Council. The ordinance was adopted in 2004 to vacate that right-of-way and it was a different lot number at the time, but it is now Lot 40. They unfortunately do not know the history or the how and why that happened, but it certainly did happen. What is a little confusing is that the tax map has never been updated to show that. The current tax map, as can be seen on their cover sheet, William Street is a right-of-way all the way out to East Commodore. Mr. Shea asked if 50% went to either owner. Mr. Macfarlane replied no, it all went to Lot 40. Mr. Shea asked if all that was recorded in the chain of title or if the property owner filed anything deed wise. Mr. Pfeffer stated that is on a neighboring property so he did not research that. Ms. DeMarzo asked why the ordinance has Lot 56. Mr. Macfarlane explained that the Township changed the lot numbers about 10 to 12 years ago, so Lot 56 is now Lot 40. Mr. Bressi thought that on a road that is vacated it always went 50% both ways. Mr. Alfieri stated that is the general rule. Mr. Bressi asked why did it go one direction. Mr. Pfeffer replied that he was not there, but it usually it goes from where the road was created from. Mr. Shea clarified that what happens with road vacation legally is that it is typically split with 50% going to the person on the right and 50% going to the person on the left. What happens in some situations is that you have one property owner and they can wave their interest. So if you had a paper road in between you and your next door neighbor, you can go to your next door neighbor and say if you sign a waiver I will pay for all of the costs of doing the road vacation, filing the applications, getting the survey and all of that if you give me your side. That happens all the time. That is an ordinary kind of customary practice. So the only thing that we are missing here is probably the waiver that they executed between each other, which is why the Committee vacated it all towards one property and not the other. That is probably what happened in 2004. That happens a good amount of the time, probably 20% to 30% of the time with road vacations. We typically do not see that here as a Board because all that happens at the Township Council level.