Newspaper Page Text
rm% city dope
Infill Housing Regs Are Almost Here
PLUS, ATHENS SEEKS AN AIRLINE, GETS A HOTEL AND MORE LOCAL NEWS
By Rebecca McCarthy, Martha Michael and Blake Aued news@flagpole.com
How does Bruce Lonnee do it? The senior
planner for Athens-Clarke County has
been talking about infill development for
almost a year—to members of the planning
commission, to homeowners, members of
community groups and anyone who has a
complaint or a concern about new houses in
their neighborhoods.
And yet, at the Dec. 15 Mayor and
Commission work session, Lonnee still
managed to sound enthusiastic and upbeat
about revised zoning regulations recom
mended by the planning commission for
adoption. These changes are designed to
address concerns of neighborhood
residents about “massing, scale and
placement” of new houses in areas
zoned for single-family houses.
When the zoning code was revised
in 2000, the emphasis was on find
ing “nooks and crannies” in town for
infill development. The push was to
have more density in-town and less
in the outlying areas. The nooks and
crannies would have access to existing
infrastructure and county services,
officials reasoned, making them
acceptable for new houses. Things
didn’t work out exactly as planned—
just drive through East Athens to see
multi-story student houses served by
a single driveway. MLK Drive offers
easily viewed examples of these flag
shaped lots, which have since been
prohibited.
Lonnee told commissioners the
planning commission also supported
proposals to hold training and educa
tional sessions about appropriate infill
development, and to create a review
process for single-family homes similar
to one in place for commercial develop
ments. Neither of these proposals requires
a change in local ordinances, so they can be
implemented immediately.
ACC commissioners questioned Lonnee
about retaining walls, which would be lim
ited to a height of 4 feet under the zoning
regulations. A towering retaining wall—and
there are several in Five Points—could place
a new house high enough to give residents
a bird’s eye view of, say, a neighboring
kitchen, and relegate those homeowners to
watching a wall.
Commissioner Melissa Link wondered
if zoning restrictions in single-family areas
in Boulevard and Normaltown would push
developers into the Hancock Corridor and
other areas zoned for multi-family hous
ing. She said she’s worried about such
unintended consequences. For this reason,
Lonnee said, officials need to revisit RM
zones.
The text amendments will come up for a
vote in the new year. [Rebecca McCarthy]
NEW AIRLINE?: The meeting closed with a
presentation from the Airport Authority’s
Airline Committee, a group of dedicated
volunteers who want affordable, depend
able air service to return to Athens-Ben
Epps Airport. They updated the Mayor and
Commission about the progress of bringing
an airline to Athens—as well as the chal
lenges of keeping an airline in business and
finding funds to continue their efforts to
find suitable air service.
Currently, charter planes, military
planes and flight schools all use the airport,
but there’s no consumer air service. From
1970-2002, U.S. Airways provided service
to Charlotte. For the next few years, there
were other companies contracting with
U.S. Airways, ending with Seaport, which
provided service to Nashville until Congress
canceled Athens’ Essential Air Service sub
sidy in 2014.
Athens is one of nine commercial air
ports in the state and one of five with no
commercial airline. Changes in the airline
industry and proximity to Atlanta seem to
have left Athens high and dry—jets have
replaced propeller planes, but smaller jets
are just too inefficient to operate.
A $17 million runway project at Ben
Epps has been completed, resulting in a
6,200-foot runway capable of accommodat
ing 70-person passenger jets regularly or a
110-person jet, the size plane UGA often
uses, five times a year, said airline commit
tee member Beth Higgins. Work on a com
mercial terminal has begun.
There seems to be a demand for air
service, judging by the number of people
from the Athens area flying out of Atlanta.
In 2013,1,660 people who live within
a 40-minute drive of Athens flew each
way per day, 94 percent into or out of
Hartsfield-Jackson. The most popular des
tinations were New York and Washington,
DC, according to an analysis of demand for
air service.
There are ways to translate demand
into sustainable air service, Higgins said.
The first step seems to be creating public-
private partnerships, as other communities
have done. They consider air service as part
of a transportation system to support other
economic initiatives. In Athens, a working
group has formed whose members come
from Piedmont Athens Regional hospital,
UGA, Georgia Power, the Athens Area
Chamber of Commerce and the Athens
Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Two federal programs provide grants to
support the development of air service, and
there are various incentive options as well.
Higgins wants the Mayor and Commission
to let airport manager Tim Beggerly apply
for a Federal Small Community Air Service
Development Grant, which can be as much
as $750,000. [RM]
TRANSPORTATION WISH LIST: Advisory com
mittee members might have outnumbered
concerned citizens, but there was no short
age of ideas for how potential sales-tax
revenue might be used at a public forum
Dec. 14.
The 22 members of the T-SPLOST
Citizens Advisory Committee have begun
formally accepting project proposals from
citizens. While the committee will not
review any proposals until March, the ideas
circulating range from simply adding cross
walks to constructing a MARTA-style train
that would connect the east and west sides
of Athens.
Reworking the Hawthorne Avenue and
West Broad Street intersection, where it can
be difficult to make a left-hand turn because
of the crooked alignment of lanes, would be
one of the simple things Charlie Gluodenis,
construction and affordable housing direc
tor for the Athens Housing Authority,
would like to see fixed.
Anything and everything bus-related
was a much larger topic. Enhancing bus
stops by weatherproofing them would be
an improvement for workers, said Michael
Smith. Others would like to see Athens
Transit increase its number of routes,
buses and operating hours to serve more
people. However, one of the restrictions of
T-SPLOST funds is the inability to use them
to pay for operating costs, such as person
nel expenses that would accumulate if addi
tional buses, routes and hours were added.
While potential big projects like bridges
and airports may make for great news sto
ries, “Athens needs the practical stuff, too,”
said University of Georgia graduate student
Austin Harrison, voicing his concern for the
large Athens population that depends solely
on pedestrian infrastructure, only to see its
design and construction fall short in terms
of safety. “Walking and biking trails are
important to the Athens fabric, but there
are people walking and biking every day on
areas they don’t have to be on,” he said, cit
ing a lack of bus routes near high schools,
causing students to have to walk close to
traffic and in inclement weather. “This
money could make a difference to them,”
Harrison said. “But will their voices come to
the forefront?”
Ideas like Harrison’s will face ongoing
projects like the Firefly Trail, which has
already received a green light from the
Mayor and Commission on a proposal to
extend the trail on an abandoned railroad
through Winterville to the county line, with
the ultimate goal of stretching to Union
Point. While completing the trail—it’s
currently only funded from downtown to
the Loop—still depends on voters approv
ing T-SPLOST next fall, “the fact that it’s
already been approved certainly speaks in
favor of the project,” said Gary Hedrick, a
member of Firefly’s board of directors.
The total cost of all proposed proj
ects will most certainly outweigh
the money, said SPLOST Program
Manager Keith Sanders, who is advis
ing the city throughout this process.
The advisory committee will review
all of the proposals based on merit,
and send a list of “potential proj
ects” to the Mayor and Commission
that would cost about 150 percent
of T-SPLOST’s estimated $104 mil
lion revenue, Sanders said. Then, the
Mayor and Commission will review
those proposals, including multiple
public hearings to help whittle down
the list, before approving a final list of
projects next August.
If ACC voters approve it next
November, the 1 percent tax will begin
in April 2018, and the generated rev
enue will be distributed among the
final projects.
Another public forum with the
advisory committee will be held
Wednesday, Jan. 11 from 5:30-7 p.m.
at the Athens-Clarke County Library.
Project request forms can be found at
athensclarkecounty.com/7165/TSPLOST
and can be submitted until Feb. 28. [Martha
Michael]
ADDA ANGLES FOR TRANSPORTATION AND
EVENT FUNDING: Before she leaves for a
new job in Glynn County at the end of the
year, the Athens Downtown Development
Authority board instructed Executive
Director Pamela Thompson to prepare a list
of downtown projects that could be funded
with T-SPLOST.
While some of the transportation proj
ects listed in Athens’ downtown master
plan fall outside of ADDA boundaries,
potential candidates for funding include
an “art walk” along Jackson Street to the
Lyndon House Arts Center and a round
about at the tough-to-navigate North
Avenue-Dougherty Street-Thomas Street
intersection. T-SPLOST or the next round
of SPLOST (another 1 percent sales tax
that’s not limited to transportation) com
ing up in 2018 could pay to finish Clayton
Street sidewalk, water and sewer improve
ments, then move on to Washington Street.
During her last meeting as executive
director Dec. 13, Thompson also asked
the board to drastically boost funding for
special events downtown, such as AthFest
and the Twilight Criterium. Currently,
the ADDA receives $60,000 from a tax
on hotel and motel rooms earmarked
4 FLAGPOLE.COM DECEMBER 21, 2016