Ed. — Archived from the Sunday, Dec. 1, print edition.
COURTHOUSE — A city consultant in November presented the first two draft chapters of the city’s update to its comprehensive plan, an important policy document that influences how local leaders use — and preserve — land in Virginia Beach.
The first two chapters of the comprehensive plan update were presented to the Planning Commission, which advises City Council, during a meeting at the municipal center on Thursday, Nov. 21. One key point was made clear in the draft and the presentation: protecting natural resources and farmland.
“One of the great assets in the city are the large protected open spaces, places like Back Bay [National] Wildlife Refuge, First Landing State Park and others,” Chris Sinclair, president of Renaissance Planning, said at the meeting. “The city has protected rural agricultural land south of the Green Line and Blue Line for farming and conservation. So there’s an abundance of natural assets in the city, and we heard during our public meetings they are to be protected.”
“That’s likely going to take place in February,” she said.
The draft chapters reflect the challenge of governing land use in a largely suburban city in which once-rapid residential growth slowed long ago, and little land remains outside a rural area residents do not want to see developed.
Major issues in the draft — flood protection and sea level rise, preserving the rural area and determining how to develop above the Green Line — followed priorities expressed by citizens.
“How to grow north of the Green Line given the fact that much of that area … is in neighborhoods that will be protected is a big focus of what we’re doing,” Sinclair said during the presentation.
“I think people are getting that connection,” he said later in the overview. “There’s not enough land north of the Green Line to develop. If we’re going to continue to grow, we need to think about the major corridors and develop along those major corridors and protect the neighborhoods.”
Other issues include affordable housing, ensuring communities remain safe, and a focus on transportation connections, as well as cultural and recreation options, he said.
The city’s Green Line, a long-established boundary meant to divide urbanized areas from the southern city’s rural communities, is sometimes misunderstood because some limited suburban-style development has been allowed south of it. The draft includes information about areas between the Green Line and the rural area by seeking to bring the Blue Line, a city services boundary, at Indian River Road formally into the plan.
“While the Green Line has historically been the primary growth management tool in the Comprehensive Plan, this update recognizes the Blue Line as an important additional tool for the first time,” the draft plan says. “Recognizing the Blue Line in combination with the Green Line will help ensure a predictable gradient between the City’s urbanized areas and its protected natural, rural and agricultural areas.”
This limits growth potential in the rural community, which residents have said they want preserved and where farming remains an industry. It would mean focusing future development and redevelopment efforts in the northern city, such as in existing Strategic Growth areas. “The SGAs and other centers north of the Green Line can not only accommodate expected growth, but they can also help attract businesses that diversify the City’s economy,” the draft says.
Suggested actions include preserving and perhaps expanding the agricultural reserve program, or ARP, which helps keep agricultural land viable for farming by purchasing development rights from landowners.
“The purpose of these is to create a policy framework specific to what is intended to happen within each of these context areas,” Sinclair said during his presentation.
Context areas are based on the Green Line, Blue Line, a coastal area and the inland city “recognizing the environment, major destinations and historic features to to direct and orchestrate goals and policies.”
Between the Green and Blue lines would be the “Courthouse context area” which includes Princess Anne Commons and the Transition area. In those areas, some limited development is possible, but the draft notes “this area serves a density and intensity step-down between the developed lands north of the Green Line and the uses south of the Blue Line.”
And the plan also defines place and corridor types, including defining a hierarchy of centers from “regional” ones such as Town Center or the resort to “city” centers balancing jobs, commerce and housing and down to “local” ones, with “a residentially-oriented mix of land uses.”
Ed. — Learn more about the comprehensive plan process online at the city website.
© 2024 Pungo Publishing Co., LLC
