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Comprehensive plan review

 

By Rudy Hemmann

The Surveyor

The Berthoud comprehensive plan review committee held a meeting the evening of Monday, June 10. The meeting was called to order shortly after 6 p.m.

According to the agenda provided, the task for the evening would be to define community design values (CDV) for rural and rural residential, as well as the suburban areas of the town’s Growth Management Area (GMA).

A preamble to the agenda states in part:

“Community design values define a community and are critical … to fulfill the Community Vision. Subsequent documents such as the Land Use Code will further refine the concepts described in the Berthoud Comprehensive Plan, so it is important to prioritize and describe the design elements that will have lasting impact on the quality of the community … Our objective will be to clarify how our community will look if areas in these land uses were developed. For example, among other considerations, we will need to consider the major roadways adjacent to developments, roadway design, appropriate right-of-way widths, surface treatments (e.g., roadway, drainage), handling pedestrian and auto connectivity (both internal and external), appropriate aesthetic treatments (e.g., landscaping, fencing, entryway), types of setbacks, expectations for density, livestock management, HOA (home owners association) management issues, septic system management, and so on. Then we will determine which elements should be directed by the town and which should be left to the owner’s/developer’s creative judgment. We also should consider short- and long-term maintenance and management needs to ensure the Community Design Values are supported.”

The statement went on to describe the eight land use types identified by the group as: rural/rural residential; suburban; master-planned mixed-use I25 node; mixed-use node; town core; Berthoud commercial gateway; transition zone; and view corridor.

It was hoped by those shepherding the review process that by beginning with the rural and suburban areas and working inward to the town core the process of developing community design values would be made easier for the committee.

Discussion regarding the difference between rural development and a true agricultural operation ensued.

Technical questions, such as minimum acreage sizes which will be allowed for residences on septic systems, eventually raised the hackles of some committee members who did not feel well enough informed concerning the various issues on which they were asked to give opinions.

Mark Chaffee stated the group was not “savvy enough to weigh in on all the different ramifications” of the questions being asked.

Mina Cox repeatedly expressed frustration with the process being undertaken by the group. “Why are we inventing everything from scratch?” asked Cox, “From the very beginning we were supposed to be updating — this is (supposed to be) an update, not a write from scratch comprehensive plan. And it continues to feel that way.”

Cox was critical of the rough draft (of the revised comprehensive plan document) she had seen thus far by stating it was a copy of a plan developed for Severance, Colo.

“I don’t think it is fair to this group that we are just taking someone else’s plan and starting from scratch when we had a perfectly good plan here and that we are not updating that plan,” stated Cox.

Cox’s view was challenged by Carol Patterson who related her recollections regarding the existing comprehensive plan.

“I empathize with your frustration, but I do think I heard, and you can correct me if I’m wrong, that a lot of (committee members) did not like the old comprehensive plan, and we had to start from scratch because it was too confusing and too long,” said Patterson.

Other committee members supported Patterson’s remarks.

Jim Birdsall challenged Cox and other committee members to review the existing comprehensive plan and show him where in the document it states what the perimeter of Berthoud should look like.

“I’ve read the document several times and I honestly don’t think I understand what the vision of Berthoud is, other than being very protective, concerned and fearful,” said Birdsall.

The group did eventually come up with some design features for rural subdivisions. Those features included; limited access to county roads, low or no maintenance entry features to the subdivision, perimeter fencing, if proposed, should be of a type which conveys rural character (e.g. wooden open rail, split rail or white vinyl) as opposed to privacy fencing, sufficiently sized lots to support an adequate septic system, connectivity between neighboring subdivisions, larger setbacks for lots which are adjacent to county roads and open space(s) to be achieved through clustering.

Trails, roadway cross sections, discouraging cul-de-sac streets and whether to include sidewalks in a rural subdivision were also topics discussed.

Since the entire meeting was spent on rural subdivisions the CDV for suburban developments will be tackled at the next session.

The next comprehensive plan review committee meeting is scheduled to be held Monday, June 17 at 6 p.m.

 

 

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