Objections told, confused reactions: citizens respond to Town road ‘changes’
The Town’s proposed major road plan, providing a cross section for certain collector and minor arterial streets, evoked objections and confusion among residents during Farragut Municipal Planning Commission’s meeting Thursday, April 17.
“We want to keep it rural,” Larry Dobbs said about Evans Road. “I would like to see like it’s done on McFee Road, in front of my place.”
“I came here to speak in opposition to what is being talked about tonight,” Red Mill Lane resident Barry Cone said. “There is a discussion about changing the character of Red Mill. There’s been a lot of discussion tonight about looking to minimize change in the character.”
He observed the cross section would cause the neighborhood to lose about 50 trees.
“I just want to verify what you all are saying because with my pie-shaped lot, you are taking a great deal of my property,” Barbara Lyke said about the Red Mill Lane cross section of the road plan. “Somebody notified me Sunday afternoon about this.”
“There’s some information on Nextdoor (social media),” Commissioner Noah Myers said.
Jeanne Brykalski called out the Nextdoor site for their reports on the issue.
“I am very saddened and deeply disgusted tonight at the number of people who came here to speak based on fear-mongering and false information that they were fed by Nextdoor and flyers in their neighborhoods,” she said. “It is not a good indication of the type of person who does this.”
“There’s no plans to do anything with this (Red Mill Lane),” Community Development director Mark Shipley said. “It may become relevant if the properties on the Biddle Farms develop. It would be a way for pedestrians and bicyclists to get from the north down to the sidewalk at Turkey Creek Road.”
However, he told Lyke there is an existing Town right-of-way on Red Mill Lane, so “a lot of what is in this cross section will be in the existing public right-of-way, especially closer to Turkey Creek Road.”
“I’m glad I signed up (to speak) because this relieves me somewhat,” Lyke said.
No action was taken, but Shipley explained the plan simply was a way to “retain the rural character of the affected areas with, in most cases, not greater than 11-foot lanes, open ditch drainage and space for street trees between the street and sidewalk or shared use path.
“Some of these streets extend into areas that are beyond the Town limits where future improvements are unlikely,” he added.
Commissioner Louise Povlin said the impetus behind the plan was that not all sizes fit all roads.
“McFee, Old Stage and Everett roads were all built with 12-foot lanes, 40-mph design speeds and they are race tracks,” she said. “We didn’t take a look at each one of them and really consider what the context is, what’s going on here.”
“This is not a plan,” Myers added. “This is a conceptional cross section that actually reduces the impact of what otherwise is required today if we were to go in and improve (the roads).”
At the same time, Shipley said the plan would assure the improvements would be “complete streets.
“The streets that were selected were determined to be streets that are currently either substandard or incomplete in terms of having a
complete streets cross section that includes provisions for motorists, pedestrians and bicyclists,” he said. “These streets, other than Boyd Station Road, are also not currently part of ongoing projects in the Town’s Capital Investment Plan.”
However, Boyd Station Road’s plan will be coming up before FMPC in May because of improvements a developer is proposing on that road.
“The intent of including desired cross sections that will ultimately be linked into the major road plan is to guide a developer or the Town on what improvements would be desired if one of the selected streets were part of a development or future CIP project,” Shipley added.
However, reports on Nextdoor left some residents confused.
Along Boring Road, a major collector street, Baldwin Park resident Christina DiMaur, said, “I don’t’ see why somebody — the Town or Board of Education — couldn’t pay to widen that road.”
Dobbs indicated the sight vision from his driveway at Evans and McFee Road, “if you increase the road width 10 feet, we already have a bad thing with speeding,” he said. “I hope if you go 10 feet, you keep it to a minimum. Right now, that’s dangerous.”
“I kind of resent Mark’s comments that they weren’t planning on doing anything to Evans Road because we all know not too long ago you all tried to take my land on Evans Road for the greenway,” Greg Wiberley said about the Evans Road cross section. “That failed.
“Then one meeting I went to last year, there was a fiscal budget for FY ’20 for Evans Road improvements,” he added. “So to say it isn’t in the works — it’s been in the works for years … you changed the rules on how roads and sidewalks are going to be designed, and now you’re moving forward, inch by inch, trying to wear us down on that.”
“I’m a little confused,” Jim Petrone said. “I went online and looked at the Town’s budget. As I saw it, there was money projected in the budget for right-of-way land acquisition to begin in 2027.
“That same document had budgeting for Virtue and Boyd Station (roads),” he added. “You can say it’s not planned and this is something not to take seriously, but obviously I do (take is seriously).”
He said a proposed walking trail would take his land, particularly where his mailbox is located. He recommended putting the trail on the other side of the road.
Regarding the cross section for Red Mill Lane, “this actually has more traffic than you think,” Shipley said. “The count I have is about 1,240 trips per day.”
