CRANBERRY TWP — Judge Michael Yeager has rejected an appeal by homeowners to change the zoning of their property in Cranberry, a decision that may end a dispute more than four years in the making.

James Wood and a dozen other property owners along the south side of Freedom Road live near the Cranberry Square commercial development. He has tried in vain to get his property rezoned from residential to commercial.

Wood maintains he can’t sell his property because of the large amounts of nearby commercial development, not to mention traffic that consistently backs up on Freedom Road all the way to the Beaver County line.

He took his fight to the township’s zoning hearing board, which rejected his request, and then he went to court.

Judge Yeager in late December ruled that Wood’s property, as well as adjoining properties, have had the same R-2 zoning classification since zoning was established in 1972 in Cranberry.

In addition, Yeager said that Wood “failed to show that the township’s refusal to rezone the property is unreasonable, arbitrary or not substantially related to the general health, safety and welfare of the community.”

The judge added Wood’s property “is no different in character from all of the properties south of Freedom Road, which are zoned residential.”

The property owners do not like the judge’s decision.

Dan Page, one of the property owners who joined the legal battle with Wood, said Tuesday that more than 30,000 cars pass by his house every day on Freedom Road, and that he has a shopping center as his view from his front yard.

“What do you think that does to my property value?” he asked.

Page said his frustration continues to grow because he sees similar situations in other areas of the township that come to agreeable resolutions.

“The real frustrating part is watching all the homes disappearing off of Route 228, all the homes disappearing off of Route 19,” Page said. “Cranberry Township designated Freedom Road as a major commercial corridor, and then they disallowed us to build (commercially) even what’s built across the street from us.”

Page said he and the other property owners plan to appeal the decision, adding that he has no other choice.

“Cranberry Township is doing what they do best, which is manipulation,” Page said. “But we’re going to carry on and proceed with this. These are legitimate concerns. (Cranberry officials) are still refusing us to go commercial to allow us to get out of here.”

For his part, Wood said Tuesday that he’s “very disappointed” in Yeager’s ruling, adding he hopes to appeal the case.

“We’re going on 40 years now,” Wood said about his property and zoning problems.

His three acres are nearly impossible to sell, Wood said, because nobody wants to live in a place with heavy traffic and commercial activity.

Bruce Mazzoni, chairman of the township supervisors, said Tuesday that Yeager’s decision to toss the appeal validates Cranberry’s zoning ordinances.

“Every (court) decision received to date reaffirmed the township was technically and legally sound in its (zoning) decision,” he said.

“The decision of the board of supervisors followed an extensive, yearlong process that involved hundreds of residents seeking the right balance of land use in the Freedom Road corridor.”

Page does not agree with that explanation and said the township is bowing down to the residents in the Sun Valley housing development, which is behind his home.

The hundreds of residents of Sun Valley, he said, don’t want Page and the other homeowners to go commercial with their property because it could mean commercial development abutting their development.

“We believe that the township is taking the neighborhood behind us, taking all of their wants and needs over ours,” Page said. “We think we are being discriminated against.”

Township manager Jerry Andree said Tuesday that opinion isn’t true, adding residents in the Sun Valley neighborhood didn’t want to see any zoning changes to the disputed properties.

Instead, Andree said, the township several years ago created an overlay that allowed for mixed-use commercial and residential development on the disputed properties, an overlay that was created after a committee of 80 people recommended the change.

Wood, Page and the other property owners weren’t satisfied with that overlay, Andree said, because it wouldn’t allow large commercial developers to buy their land.

There has been a lot of compromise between the township and Sun Valley residents, Andree said, compromise that hasn’t been embraced by Wood and the other property owners.

“This was not done in a vacuum, that’s for sure,” Andree said about the overlay committee. “It was excruciating.”

Both Wood and Page said they plan to appeal the decision to the state Commonwealth Court.