Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 16, 1995 TAG: 9502160064
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Roanoke County this week gave developer Len Boone another incentive to make his Cotton Hill Road subdivision blend in with the adjacent Blue Ridge Parkway.
In exchange for building his development's sewer pump station big enough to serve other houses in the area, county supervisors approved giving Boone a 50 percent credit on part of the cost of sewer construction.
Such credits are part of a county policy to encourage developers to build oversize public utility facilities so they cover some of the cost the county later could have to pay anyway. To get public water and sewer service at his development - which isn't served by those utilities - Boone has to pay for construction of the lines and the pump station, which he then must donate to the county.
In exchange, supervisors can offer up to a 50 percent credit on the developer's cost of hooking up each house in his subdivision to those utilities. But supervisors tied the approval of Boone's credit to his getting a permit from the National Park Service to run the sewer line under the parkway.
Boone wants to build 201 houses on both sides of the parkway, so he must run the lines under the road to serve all of them. Park service officials have said they will grant a permit to do that only if Boone agrees to work with the private Coalition for the Blue Ridge Parkway. The coalition is working with Boone and another developer to make their developments less obtrusive to parkway motorists.
Boone has agreed to such concessions as using native building materials, building wooden rather than metal fences and situating houses behind hills. Driving the parkway is meant to be an experience in Appalachian culture - barns, rolling hills, mountains and cows - and coalition members fear that modern subdivisions next to the scenic road will mar that experience.
The vote to grant Boone the sewer line credit passed 4-1, with Supervisor Lee Eddy opposing it. Eddy worried that approving the credit before Boone's plans have been approved would leave the county without a valuable bargaining chip.
"Should we be taking steps to encourage development next to the parkway before we know what's being proposed?" Eddy asked.
But County Administrator Elmer Hodge said that tying the credit to the parkway's approval of a permit actually gives the county more leverage. Hodge serves on the coalition and thus is part of the group working with Boone to make sure his houses are compatible with the parkway.
"If he doesn't comply, there's no permit, and he loses the reimbursement," Hodge said, adding that Boone is cooperating with the coalition.
Boone attended a three-day workshop last month with the coalition to work on his plans.
Hodge also said getting Boone to build an oversize pump station is to the county's benefit, because the individual septic systems serving existing homes around Cotton Hill are bound to fail.
If the county has to go back in a few years and build a bigger pump station, it will have to bear the whole cost by itself, he said.
The Coalition for the Blue Ridge Parkway was formed last year after Roanoke County's zoning dispute with Boone highlighted how vulnerable the parkway can be to development. The group is made up of public officials, environmentalists, builders and others from Virginia and North Carolina; members are working to protect the national park by getting zoning restrictions along the parkway and voluntary compliance from landowners.
by CNB