THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 30, 1996 TAG: 9609300046
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY NANCY LEWIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 59 lines
The City Council must decide Tuesday whether to alter the city's General Plan to make commercial land use more possible along the 1500 block of Bay View Blvd. .
As it stands, the General Plan calls for the properties that comprise the commercial hub at the heart of Bay View to eventually become residential. The proposal facing the council would rescind that predestination and expand the commercial zone to include several nearby properties.
In recent months, the issue has caused a rift in the normally peaceful community at the north end of the city.
The unpretentious stores and shop - a grocery, a ``medicine''-soda fountain, a hair cuttery - that make up the commercial clutch at the intersection of Fishermans Road and Bay View Boulevard could be missed in the blink of an eye. But a passing glance is all it takes to see that the facades need freshening.
In August, neighborhood leaders hoped to give business a boost when they proposed the land-use change.
Some of the questions that Bay View Civic League directors had on their minds were:
Why would merchants want to paint up or fix up when their fiscal future looked so bleak?
Why would they bother when the city's General Plan ordained that homes would stand on the properties someday?
And who would buy any of the businesses, given their future?
While the civic leaders proposed altering the city's long-term plan for the community, a large contingent of residents had a different opinion and wasted no time saying so.
Property values and neighborhood character were in jeopardy, residents said. When the City Council opened a public hearing on the subject last week, proponents and opponents were waiting in line to air their views.
Robin Wallace, a Bay View resident who lives close to the commercial section at issue, was one of about 10 opponents who spoke.
``I moved from Virginia Beach into what I thought was an established city so I didn't have to worry about things like roads coming through, and now I'm faced with property owners, practically in my back yard, wanting the vision changed,'' Wallace said.
``I don't know what might go up there.''
Wallace said that she and 705 of her Bay View neighbors also object to the way the civic league's action took place without a vote of the general membership.
``We've been muffled, stifled by our own civic league,'' she said.
The City Council closed Tuesday's public hearing after taking statements from about 20 citizens, then deferred voting on the plan until this week.
City Planner Brian Townsend said the original proposal has been changed somewhat to reflect citizens' concerns.
Three residential properties on Croyden Road are no longer included in the properties that could be used for commercial purposes under the Planning Commission's recommendation, he said. And no drive-through businesses or access to or parking for commercial properties on or through residential lots is permissible.
KEYWORDS: NORFOLK CITY COUNCIL by CNB