Here are some news clips from the Town of Davidson webpage that will give you an idea of the major planning issues in Davidson. 5.

Town Board Approves New Planning Ordinance

Date: September 1, 2001

If you’ve driven through the rural areas of Davidson in the past few months, you’ve probably noticed signs that proclaim “Stop the Land Grab.” What you may not know is what prompted these signs and the issues that have sparked this debate.

The signs refer to sections of the proposed Davidson Planning Ordinance, which has a basic requirement of 50 percent open space with development clustered on the remaining 50 percent. The ordinance has been reviewed and developed with citizen input through a series of public meetings, individual meetings with property owners, and planning workshops over the past 18 months.

“We believe the proposed ordinance breaks new ground and is a model for small towns everywhere—particularly those facing explosive growth,” said Planning Director Warren Burgess. While Davidson planners believe the ordinance will benefit the entire community and help Davidson retain its unique character, Burgess does acknowledge the ordinance does not meet with universal approval.

Some landowners perceive the 50 percent open space requirement as “grabbing” the land—and have contracted with a political lobbying firm to help them promote that message. Here are the facts:

• The proposed ordinance requires 50 percent of land in the ETJ to remain open space thus maintaining Davidson’s unique rural character.

• The open space requirement, however, may be reduced as the town acquires land in the rural area. In addition, developers can have the requirement reduced if they transfer open space from another site, or if they make the open space publicly accessible.

• Despite assertions to the contrary, there is NO requirement that the Town own the open space. The land can be privately owned and may be held by the current owner, a homeowners’ association, a hobby farmer, or a land conservancy.

• The preserved open space has a wide range of potential uses. It could be used for private ventures, such as small farms, equestrian centers, estate lots, or pick-your-own fruit operations, just to name a few.

• The other 50 percent of land would be for cluster developments. The advantages of clustering and the resulting open space are numerous. “Clustering allows us to protect the air and water; it produces walkable communities, so that we don’t have to rely quite as much on the automobile; it preserves an irreplaceable resource for future generations; and it makes it much easier to build community,” said Burgess.

Planning and Zoning News

December 2001

Since the Town Board adopted our new planning ordinance in June, the planning staff has received many new project applications from developers who are eager to get projects underway. The review process, depending on the size and complexity of the project, now begins with a public charrette (workshop) that may take an afternoon or a week. Charrettes are scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis.

Three of the first project proposals submitted under the new ordinance are located within the extraterritorial zoning jurisdiction to the east of Town. In fact, several of the tracts in question—Bradford I (50 acres), Bradford II (70 acres), and the Spencer-Verner property (almost 70 acres)—share property lines. Because of the properties’ close proximity, a joint planning charrette was held in August providing individual developers an opportunity to work together to ensure that the resulting plan included interconnected open space, pedestrian paths, and roads to foster a sense of community.

The fourth project to be addressed in this first round of charettes is a 200+ acre parcel located near Highway 73 and adjoining Cabarrus County. The developer says the project, described as a traditional neighborhood, will create “a unique, mixed-use community consistent with the goals, policies, and guidelines established [by the] planning ordinance.”

Other projects in the pipeline include the following:

-500 acres including the Fisher Farm and surrounding properties

-a 29-acre parcel off June Washam Road

-an application for a mixed-use building on the South Main Street property adjacent to the Merrill-Jennings Gallery

-a conditional use request from The Pines to expand and build a new connecting road to Cornelius

Planning News

For news stories related to traffic and parking on Main street, please click here., then open the "current issue" and "winter 2001" headings.

Description of Project:

GIS is a necessary tool for planning, analyzing, modeling and managing information. GIS organizes information into images that enable the user to easily understand complex environmental, economic, and social issues. GIS can also be an effective tool for collaboration and coordination of programs, policies and activities. The Town of Davidson can benefit from GIS technology, especially with the cooperative sharing of data. Cooperative sharing of data is what made it possible for me to do this project.

ESRI has recently published a book called Transportation GIS, useful for transportation professionals managing equipment and infrastructure: " Whether it's monitoring train locations, tracking flight paths and noise levels, planning for highway maintenance, or improving bus routes, GIS helps private organizations and public agencies improve safety and reduce costs. Transportation GIS presents a dozen fascinating case studies from the following organizations, which use GIS in a wide range of transportation planning and management activities." 4.

The primary purpose of this study is to find which new street connections are the most crucial and the most easily facilitated to improve Davidson's traffic flow patterns. Davidson's Main Street and Griffin Streets are especially crowded with traffic, making it difficult and unsafe for pedestrians to cross. My project was to find and illustrate new street connections that can displace traffic from these main roads to secondary streets, lessening the amount of traffic on those roads at a given time. The major issue at stake is transportation safety, whether by car, foot, or bicycle.

This is the step by step process I used to make my analyses:

1. Opened Mecklenburg County data in ArcView.

2. Opened Road, parcel and aerial view themes in view.

3. Queried for streets between which I could draw a polyline connection/extension.

4. Queried parcels to find out which properties the new roads would interfere.

4. Drew these polylines and saved as a layout image. Exported the images.

5. Used Network Analyst to find current best routes between streets.