Eldersburg residents will have a chance to discuss plans for the controversial Liberty Exchange business park project in Eldersburg this week with a representative of the developing St. John Properties.

Thomas Pilon, development director for St. John, is scheduled to speak at the Thursday, May 21, meeting of the Freedom Area Citizens' Council. The meeting will be at 7:30 p.m. at the South Carroll Senior Center, 5747 Bartholow Road, Eldersburg.

Liberty Exchange is being proposed at the site of the former Freedom Golf Center at 438 Old Liberty Road near Gera Way.

Plans call for two, 16,645-square-foot retail strip center buildings, as well as a 4,000-square-foot bank, a 6,000-square-foot restaurant and two office/warehouse buildings totaling 127,400 square feet.

The Liberty Exchange proposal also includes two 24,480-square-foot office buildings and a 12-pump gas station with a convenience store.

Ellen Dix, FACC president, said residents' concerns include traffic and road design and the location of gas tanks and pumps.

Another issue is the land itself. Larry Twele, director of Carroll County Department of Economic Development, has noted that the land has been zoned industrial since the 1970s, but Dix contends that industrial land should not have been located that close to homes.

She said neighbors have had the expectation that uses similar to a golf center would be placed at that property, not warehouses.

"Even the people who don't live out there think we should have economic development, but it should be clustered in an industrial area -- not around residential homes," she said.

Dix said she met with St. John representatives last week and said the gas tanks, which were originally located to nearby homes, are now proposed to be on the opposite side of the property, but is unsure the location of the pumps.

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