Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/215277
Sarasota News Leader November 22, 2013 presented by staff as part of its long-term review of 2050 — among them a reduction in the number of housing types required to be built in neighborhoods and the elimination of a requirement that a new neighborhood's commercial sector be located inside the community. The change in rules opens the doors for developers to build fewer housing types within a new community, and to place commercial properties closer to arterial roads. Page 42 she wanted to make sure that the language doesn't allow commercial centers to become mere strip malls. Everyone, it seems, wants to avoid creating more Bee Ridge Roads. "I'd love to see language that pushes it in the direction of integrating other than at the front," she added, saying staff should be "beefing up" its language to make sure that happens. Working into the evening, the commission also approved a timetable for 2050 changes in A longtime critic of the decision to rewrite 2050, the county's comprehensive plan, scheduling Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood a series of public meetings on the topic and Associations President Lourdes Ramirez said sending them on to the Planning Commission. allowing developers to move the commercial center outward will degrade walkability, a But that's not all. In earlier action, the County key component of 2050's New Urbanist prin- Commission approved changes to 2050 affectciples. Commissioners disagreed, pointing ing 4,638 acres along Clark Road east of the to the failure of commercial village centers interstate, opening the possibility of 9,334 — in planned communities, such as Disney's rather than 934 — units there. Celebration here in Florida, as evidence that That proposal, brought by representatives of the New Urbanist layout simply doesn't work. LT Ranch and 3 H Ranch, called for a change Commissioner Nora Patterson voted to in how density rules are calculated, a reducapprove the zoning changes, but she said tion in the amount of open space required to A chart shows revised percentages of land use requirements for village centers under the Sarasota 2050 Plan. Image courtesy Sarasota County