Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, December 16, 1994                   TAG: 9412190037
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-22   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

LUGS

But it is more to reduce conflict than to cause it that zoning laws are put in place. Or, in the case of Bedford County, that a Land-Use Guidance System was enacted.

The fact that some land-use decisions under LUGS go against individual property-owners' development plans is not necessarily evidence that the system doesn't work. More likely, it is evidence that it is working as intended, to guide growth in ways compatible with a county's comprehensive plan.

Local governments have a legitimate interest in the localities' future prosperity, as well as the immediate responsibility of providing basic services - schools, police, roads - at taxpayers' expense.

Residents, too, have interests beyond the tax tab - from the impact development will have on their quality of life, to their own rights as property owners to protect the value of their homes and land.

Such interests are bound to conflict at some point, and planning tools such as zoning and LUGS are designed to resolve them by reference to some sort of consistent standard. LUGS is a point system that takes into consideration numerous factors, such as surrounding land use and availability of utilities.

It's drawing criticism in Bedford now, as being too complicated to understand, too uncertain for developers who don't want to buy property for projects that, once assigned LUGS points, are found to be incompatible with surrounding land use. With zoning, some builders say, at least they would know up-front what uses are permitted.

LUGS requires a public hearing on every application to build on vacant land, giving neighbors a valuable opportunity to weigh in. It is in some ways more flexible and objective than zoning. And it does protect property values. But if county property owners don't like it, they should accept the alternative: zoning.

Bedford's supervisors have asked the county Planning Commission to study LUGS, in use five years now, and the feasibility of combining it or replacing it with zoning. This is a reasonable course, so long as it doesn't end on a road back to pre-LUGS days, when there was no zoning either.