Inside views and news

The SKINNY G E O R G E T O W N - S C O T T C O U N T Y

P L A N N I N G C O M M I S S I O N November 2014

October

Halloween is a fun time in the Planning Office. Here’s ZZ Pop!

Is Walkability Important? One of the major components of the Planning Commission’s work is defining the scope and content of development regulations. Development regulations establish the minimum design standards for roads and other infrastructure within new development projects. New projects must be designed to these standards while the Planning Commis-sion oversees to make sure the plans and subsequent construction meet these minimum requirements. But what about those more subjective standards, that if established would promote the public good? Architectural quality and walkability for example. According to na-tional studies, 25% of all trips are less than a mile, but 75% of those trips are made by car. Streets too wide for crossing, lack of sidewalks, crosswalks, and bike lanes, and disbursed land uses make automobile travel the required choice. But good design could effect that travel mode decision. Bad design, poor material choices, shoddy construction quality, or lack of concern for how a building fits into its surroundings create places without character that degrade the public realm and are not desirable to visit. Good design and walkable, connected land uses increase commercial activity and create incentives for people to get out and about. A large segment of the population is not old enough to drive, cannot afford to drive long distances for daily needs, or simply wishes to cut down on daily driving. The Planning Commission has begun work on a Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan for Scott County, with the long term goal of identifying the need and desire for bicycle and pedes-trian infrastructure in new development. An additional goal is to plan where it would be desirable and practical to retrofit existing streets to make our community more accessible for all citizens. It is our job to ensure that minimum community standards are met for public infrastructure. The proposed Bicycle/Pedestrian Plan will aim to gather communi-ty input on what those standards should be and how and when they should be applied. Intentional design and develop-ment of walkable places addresses many of the biggest challenges of our time, including environmental resilience, economic development, job creation, affordable housing, re-duction of obesity and not least, the maintenance of our small town scale and sense of place.

Construction Progress

The old Marathon station at the Sadieville exit on I-75 was demolished, making way for the new Love’s Truck Stop.

New building permits City 44 County 17 Subdivision plats reviewed and recorded 9 LOC sureties $4.58M Cash sureties $ 303K

In the Pipeline

Bluegrass Pediatics & Internal Medicine - 7,265 sq. ft. medical facility on Canewood Center Dr. Everybody’s Auto Sales North - addition to existing facility on the corner of Scotland Dr. and Paris Pk. Commonwealth Tool & Machine - 26,400 sq. ft. addition to existing facility in the Stamping Ground Industrial Park

Mapping Your World

An invisible, ancient source of energy surrounds us—energy that powered the first explorations of the world, and that may be a key to the future. Click on the map below to view a real-time tracery of wind flowing over the U.S.