Traffic study a must: Horne plans delayed
FMPC denies requested rezonings; developer cites possible misunderstanding, vows to submit study
Developer Doug Horne suffered a setback last week when Farragut Municipal Planning Commission denied approval of both of his zoning amendment requests – one of which is required to meet his goal of building a second Town center — citing incomplete applications.
Horne, owner of Republic Newspapers Inc.. (parent company of farragutpress), had two applications before the FMPC. The first requested rezoning of 20 acres north of the old Ingles building from R-1, Rural Single-Family residential, to R-6, multi family residential, where Horne is seeking to build senior multi-family housing.
The second rezoning actually was several requests pertaining to the 68.31-acre tract, which is owned by former Town Mayor Eddy Ford along Kingston Pike less than a mile west of the Pike’s intersection with Campbell Station Road. Primary among them was a request to rezone Ford’s property, where Horne is planning his AGORA Town Center development complete with commercial, retail, multi-family and townhomes.
The change would have added R-4 attached single family residential and R-6/OMSR Open space Multi-Family residential.
Vice Mayor Louise Povlin, who also sits as an FMPC commissioner, made the motion to deny both requests, which were separate agenda items, after noting both applications lacked pre-requisite traffic studies.
“The rezoning request is not complete because he has not filed a traffic impact study,” she said of the first request. “We need a complete application before the Planning Commission can fully discuss this application. This is a requirement.”
Povlin cited Section 22-147 (a)(1) of the Driveways and Other Accessways ordinance as found in Chapter 22 Article 5 of Farragut Municipal Code.
“If we start debating and move up to the Board of Mayor and Aldermen an incomplete application, or zoning request, we are setting a very dangerous precedent,” she said. “Traffic impact studies can be expensive, but they are a necessary part of what the Planning Commission needs to make a recommendation.”
“We will agree to do the traffic study, we can make this a subject-to — we did one in the past, without access to Boring Road, but we will do one with access to Boring Road,” Horne said during discussion of the first request.
“We’ll take it off the agenda and do the traffic study. We’ll put it back on after we do the study,” he added.
However, Town Community Development director Mark Shipley recommended the FMPC proceed on the agenda item.
“My recommendation is that you take action on it,” Shipley said. “We have talked about it, had two workshop sessions and we have talked about the traffic impact study.”
The FMPC twice voted 9-0 against approving the requests.
“I’m shocked and bewildered at the tactic the Planning Commission is using,” Horne said during discussion on the second request for the Ford property. “I’m surprised, the way we were treated on both proposals.”
“You have not submitted all the information required,” FMPC chair Rita Holladay said.
“You should have said we had to submit the traffic study,” Horne said.
“What we are doing is what we would do to any applicant with an incomplete submittal,” Vice Chair Ed St. Clair added.
“We talked about the traffic impact study, and it was in the Planning Commission report sent out to everyone, including the applicant, that the traffic impact study was required,” Shipley said.
“I’d like to make sure we treating Mr. Horne and his applications the same, and as fairly, as we did Budd Cullom and his application,” Commissioner Noah Myers said.
“We are, and in fact (Cullom) provided a traffic impact study and we had a third party evaluate it,” Shipley replied. “We are being consistent.
“We talked about this traffic impact study for months, on both these projects — we need the information, the Planning Commission does, to have all the guidance they need make an informed recommendation to the Board of Mayor and Aldermen,” he added.
“What you should have said, in my opinion is, ‘Do the traffic study.’” Horne said. “Our guy, John Wright, thought we had to do it before the Board of Mayor and Aldermen vote. We may have misunderstood that.
“That’s why I say we are shocked and bewildered,” the developer added. “If you check with your Town counsel, and we will check with ours, we will do the study and resubmit. “We don’t want to wait a year or six months, that’s not fair.”
Shipley said he would be speaking to Town attorney Tom Hale about the matter.
During a follow-up interview, Horne said, “We believe the Farragut Planning Commission should ask the property owner to submit any item that is needed before the vote on the development project, and not vote until the missing items are in.
“There are private property rights to consider, and sometimes millions of dollars of equity and investment to be considered and the Planning Commission and the Board of Mayor and Alderman should be more property owner- and investment-friendly if they want the Town to grow and really prosper financially,” he added. “If not, the residential property owners will be faced with a property tax soon.”
