Making Room for Growth

Boone's Development Services provide solutions for area expansion

By Brooke Ford
LiveWire

How do you grow in a valley? In 2008 alone Boone’s population was 13,472, while it’s heart, Appalachian State, pumped 15,117 students into the town’s veins. Boone’s Development services provides solutions on building and zoning growth, allowing for smooth circulation of its residents.

John Spear has been working with the town for close to twelve years and the latter half has been as Boone’s Planning Director.  Spear explained that a majority of building in the area is based on multi-family housing focused towards the students, but large retailers like Wal-Mart and Lowe’s are also related to the amount of growth seen in the area.

“Students make up the largest segment of the community. The university has done little new development with housing on campus: not enough to keep up with the student population,” says Spear.

Student-focused housing includes The Village of Meadowview and Mountaineer Village, which creates a combined average of 1,000 rooms. There is constant push and pull of resources between the town accommodating local residents and the University’s off campus student residents. While the influx is welcome, it causes yet another added strain to Boone’s water and sewage systems.

“To upgrade the system would cost upwards of 20 to 40 million dollars, and the town’s current budget is only around 10 million”, said Spear. “Updating the town’s system will cost considerably more, but agreements have been made with the University for a water-interconnect so that we can find out what the actual demand will be.”

In 1998 and 1999, Boone expanded its Extra Territorial Jurisdiction, or ETJ, about six miles in total to the Eastern and Western written limits. The town was able to take in 1,000 more parcels of land that now fall under the town’s jurisdiction and zoning.

“It’s not corporate limits, so we really haven’t expanded our corporate boundaries that much,” says Spear. “The properties in ETJ do not pay any taxes, and they don’t receive any town services other than fire protection and housing code enforcement.”

Anyone who receives town services in the ETJ, has voluntarily annexed their property to the town and pays taxes for their water and sewage usage.

In 2003, building and construction profits reached $10,000,000 in the fourth quarter alone. In 2008, construction had a zero profit.

“There are several projects that have received their permits or development approvals, because of the downturn in economy, they’ve not been able to gain financing in their projects, so it’s delaying the process and really stopped them from going online,” Spear responds to the lack of building over the past year.

In the case of building in Boone, obtaining a permit can take anywhere from three days to three months depending on the size and impact of the project. Smaller locally impacting businesses and homes find space where they can and typically have a two to three day turnaround for permission, while larger regionally impacting retailers and apartment buildings may take two months or more.

Larger projects require at least one month of coordination and board approval at a public hearing. The coordination plans must be submitted three weeks prior to the once-monthly meeting. In the case of Watauga High School, 70 acres of land had to be rezoned and subdivision processes had to be done in order to combine the land. The project went from planning Board to the Town Council, which only meets on a quarterly basis.

The zoning laws for the town are becoming outdated and inefficient for steady population growth. Boone is a valley with ridges and flood planes surrounding it. Current zoning codes suggest width wise expansion, but there are not many places to expand to. In order to grow out, the town must have a continuous linear growth: it cannot expand in arms. Recommendations are being discussed to increase the allowable building height, in particular to encourage mixed-use facilities. To encourage builders to create sustainable buildings, incentives are being offered to alleviate some of the extra costs.

Other snags involve the ETJ, because properties annexed prior to 1998 may fall in between Boone and Watauga County making it difficult to know from whom they receive services. When more of the property lies within the town’s jurisdiction, the services are provided by Boone and vice versa. When the ETJ was expanded in 1998, the issue was resolved by stretching the borders along ridgelines and other geological boundaries.   

“Development is fairly permanent,” explains Spear, “We’re looking to build smarter, and grow smarter. We’re looking to find where the green infrastructure is and preserve it. We’re trying to provide infill development, instead of rationing all the land for parking lots.”                       

The town has had limited involvement in working with the University for planning purposes in the past.

“We don’t do any plan reviews, mainly just permit a number of University buildings and site plan review”, says Spear, “Inspections and other reviews are done by the state.”

Spear mentions that the 2008-2009 academic year is the first that the University and the town have worked together on long-range planning projects, as well as updating the campus’s 20/20 master plan.

“Overall, what we really need to figure out is where are the best places to put student housing,”says Spear, advocating that student housing should be as close to campus as possible. “They [housing] should be within walking distance, biking distance or within easy access of mass transit. We would like to see the higher density housing.”

Since annexing is voluntary, and the town is trying to build up on existing development, any further expansion would lie off of Route 421 near Deep Gap.

“That area is logical focus. We could put a TON of housing for that area, and try to extend bus routes for commuting”, says Spear.