[ad_1]
Front Royal residents, business owners and other stakeholders can help shape the city’s future.
The Planning and Zoning Department has scheduled a kick-off for Tuesday as part of the work to update the comprehensive plan. The service plans to hold information sessions from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the downtown Pavilion, rain or shine.
The event begins the process of updating the plan, which city officials use as a guide when considering land use planning and other actions that affect Front Royal. The plan defines what the city should look like in the next 30 years. The city hired Summit Engineering as a consultant to work with staff on the update. Authorities expect the process to take about a year and a half. The work also includes an update to the future land use map that identifies desired uses for areas of the city.
The city has not made a full update to its comprehensive plan since 1998, planning director Lauren Kopishke said Thursday. Kopishke took over as head of the planning and zoning department this summer just as the city began work on the update.
Residents, business and property owners and others in the community share an interest in the city’s future and play an important role in creating the overall plan, Kopishke said.
The city recently posted a link on its website to the Global Plan stakeholder survey. Kopishke said the city and the consultant will use the survey results in the update process. Anyone interested in participating in the survey can click on the link provided on the city’s website, https://www.frontroyalva.com/.
Kopishke explained the importance of the Global Plan and the role it plays as a guide for the future.
“It guides the decision-making on our side and sort of determines, you know, what the future of the city will look like,†Kopishke said. “So it’s long range, 30 years later. So we ask people “what do you want Front Royal to be in 30 years”, you know, “how do you see the streets and the traffic, the development?” where infill development should take place, redevelopment. “
Kopishke used as an example a developer who proposes to rezone farmland and build several houses on the property. The proposal may be in line with the overall plan if the document says Front Royal is considering townhouses for that site, Kopishke said. The municipal authorities could then give the green light to the developer to request a rezoning. The developer may not be able to build townhouses on the property if the overall plan calls for the land to remain in a zoned district with limited housing density.
The state requires localities to have comprehensive plans and that planning commissions review documents every five years, Kopishke said. Usually, planning committees do not write the plans. But the Front Royal Planning Commission drew up a comprehensive plan a few years ago with the help of Summit Engineering. But then the city fired its planning director, and the commission never had a chance to hold a public hearing on the plan.
Now, work on the update will include what the commission had already done as well as information gathered from the polls, Kopishke said.
[ad_2]
Comments are closed.