Q&A on UDAs

There are some issues that have not really been fully dealt with.

The first is that while we are projected to have growth in population – it is not addressed where the new growth will work and this is a key premise of UDAs – live, WORK, and play.

So how does that concept work in commuter-centric, exurban commuters.

The second is the difference between a designated UDA in already developed areas ripe for re-development verses \Greenfield\ UDAs even if within areas designated for water and sewer.

Just because a UDA is within an area designated for water and sewer does not mean there is money to put it in right now. Developers buy water/sewer hook-ups but the county has to front the money via loans that affect it’s ability to borrow for other projects. The loans also have to be paid back and if the market does not generate enough cash flow to repay the loans the taxpayers have to pick it up until the market improves.

Just because an area is designated for water/sewer does not mean how man taps were planned. For instance, if the water/sewer for the Rt 17 UDA was originally premised on commercial and/or 1/4 residential – that may well be a lower demand than higher-density mixed-use. This in turn affects other places that have been designated to be served by water/sewer because the total number of new taps is limited by the size of the existing plant and it’s available capacity. With the advent of new rules by the state, adding water/sewer capacity is going to be very expensive so our existing capacity is being allocated in a different way than originally premised in terms of density and if you make one area denser than originally premised it means the other areas may not be actually able to be served once the existing capacity is allocated to UDAs. This aspect was never addressed.

Finally – UDAs in already-developed – and ALREADY infrastructured areas means you take advantage of EXISTING mobility infrastructure AND existing Transit service.

Lafayette boulevard would be an example where the basic infrastructure already exists and would have to be upgraded but not built from scratch.

Lafayette boulevard would also much more likely serve local working people rather than attract more NoVa commuters as the Route 17 area will.

The other issue with the Route 17 area is that is does not have the existing mobility infrastructure to serve the number of people the UDA is designed to have, nor, more importantly, the KIND of commuter which may not be local workers but more NoVa commuter workers.

That level of road infrastructure does not exist. So basically, the county, by designating a greenfield UDA is INVITING mixed-use proposals from developers with no viable funded or planned funded road infrastructure plan beyond lines drawn on a map.

Yes they have VRE but VRE, right now, is maxed on carrying capacity. We’re talking about tens of thousands of new people that may well be NoVa commuters who ostensibly – \live, work, and play\ in the UDA but in reality will be trying to get on an already-maxed VRE or on an-already maxed (at rush hour), U.S. Route 1 and Massaponax interchange.

I would submit that these key issues, that THESE Q&As have not been addressed adequately despite the claimed fact that many meetings have been held and many people attending them.

Some of those meetings were basically asking people where they wanted the growth and what kind, i.e. TND, etc but the issues of how to accommodate the growth – not addressed fully.

And this has been the problem with Spotsylvania and growth from the beginning.

The schools, they are forced by law to deal with. But in the past they depended on VDOT to build the roads needed and that did not happen because the county permitted far more growth than there were available dollars for new roads.

I’m not arguing against growth nor the UDAs but a process where we really don’t address the infrastructure consequences when we make these decisions.

It would have been perfectly legal to designate the area on both sides of Lafayette as UDA as several other places actually did.

That area is ripe for redevelopment, has existing roads and transit and water/sewer and although developers prefer greenfield development and NoVa commuters want sprawl-type subdivisions – what does Spotsylvania want and what are the financial consequences in dollars of the Route 17 area?

In dollars and cents how much will it cost to put in the additional infrastructure and what affect will it have on our available water/sewer capacity with the 8du density compared to the original density premises for water/sewer in that area?

UDAs in exurban commuter-centric communities won’t work the same way as UDAs in areas where there are local jobs, existing water/sewer/transit infrastructure but not enough housing.

Spotsy has always had the problem of how to accommodate growth that is primarily intensive, consumptive use of transportation AND water/sewerinfrastructure.

If the past, VDOT obligingly put the requested new roads on the \list\ but the \list\ was way bigger than could be funded – but that did not matter because the BOS would simply blame the lack of roads for new growth on VDOT.

Now we know that VDOT is not likely to build much of the transportation infrastructure needed to serve the Route 17 UDA – as they indicated in their correspondence..

It is my view that when the planners knew that the roads were not going to be built to serve the UDA that they had a choice as to whether they should designate a greenfield UDA that did not have the required transportation infrastructure NOR was there any viable plan to provide it -

at that point, they COULD have designated a non-greenfield UDA that already had existing infrastructure – that would meet the requirements of the State and at the same time INVITE developers – like Lee Garrison – to propose re-development UDAs that would be much less consumptive of the county finances.

Why in the world, they picked the industrial area of 4-mile fork rather than the residential area along Lafayette is beyond comprehension.

They did have an extensive public process but I feel it was \managed\ to the point that things like redevelopment of existing residential verses greenfield designation – and the pros and cons of those two approaches – were never really discussed in any substantive way and they certainly did not address how such intensive greenfield development would have a master transportation plan – similar to the water/sewer master plan.

Even the water/sewer master plan will have to be updated because it was premised on 4u density in that area and now it will be 8du. That means a lot more water/sewer infrastructure that will have to be built than was probably originally planned – but we don’t even know that because all we got was the water/sewer guy getting up and essentially saying \we’ve got it covered\ as opposed to an analyses that disclosed the impacts – and I feel – respected the citizens by giving them the information that was relevant in making that decision.

This is the kind of thing that got Spotsylvania in trouble before … not enough planning for roads nor water/sewer and both experienced the need for costly retrofitting.

I’m disappointed that the primary goal seemed to be to fast track the planners recommendations – which, as I’ve said, seemed to be biased toward greenfield UDAs rather than redevelopment UDAs – which are less consumptive of tax dollars and less of a liability to build the infrastructure.

The Rt 17 UDA does have the consequence of making \available\ water/sewer/transportation (and other) infrastructure for developer proposals.

If proposals