County staff lays out places for high-density, mixed-use development.

PDF: View a map of the proposed growth areas.

Date published: 11/28/2007

Spotsylvania County supervisors and planning commissioners got their first look last night at five areas where county staff proposes high-density, mixed-use development.

And almost immediately, they expressed concerns that these ultra-dense communities will spur more residential growth if zoning is not adjusted in other parts of the county.

The General Assembly mandated that high-growth localities like Spotsylvania create Urban Development Areas by July 1, 2011.

The UDAs are to accommodate growth for at least 10 years and for as long as 20 years.

For Spotsylvania, that means homes for at least an additional 28,000 people.

Traditional Neighborhood Development ordinances can be used to shape the UDAs into high-density communities that reduce sprawl by providing a mix of uses that allow residents to live, work, shop and play in the same development, said county planner Patrick Mulhern.

The five UDAs that the Planning Department proposed total more than 3,800 acres.

Supervisor Gary Jackson said he sees merit in the functions of UDAs and TND ordinances.

But he is concerned that they could be a “de facto upzoning” if adjustments are not made in other parts of the county.

Planning Commissioner Kevin Leahy echoed Jackson’s concerns.

“I don’t see the other part of the equation, which is how do you remove the current growth we are getting, the bad growth if you will, off the books?” he said.

“Unless we do something with the other side of the equation, I don’t see it balancing out.”

Supervisor Hap Connors said he is getting some “push-back” from residents on these high-density areas for the same concerns Jackson and Leahy expressed.

“I like some of the land-use ideas, but it is by all means imperfect. We are going to have to actually make this policy work and it is going to be difficult to do that given the constraints we have,” Connors said.

County Attorney Jacob Stroman said Isle of Wright shrunk its primary settlement district to accommodate these higher-density, mixed-use developments.

“I don’t know if there can be a zero-sum gain, but it may have a beneficial effect.”

Jackson said after the meeting that the perfect solution is to transform by-right development into the UDAs, but that would require a politically unpopular downzoning.

There are approximately 23,869 development rights on 113,020 acres in Spotsylvania County, according to planning documents.

“There is no way to stop the dumb growth, the by-right development,” Jackson said.

“It is costly and it has impacts we can’t address. This new smart growth will, in theory, avoid all of those problems. But we are still going to get all the existing growth in the by-right we have out there.”

Dan Telvock: 540/374-5438 dtelvock@freelancestar.com

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Date published: 11/28/2007