Title
Special Area Plan for Southeast Gainesville Renaissance Initiative Area (B)
Explanation
The City is proposing an initiative for the renaissance of the Southeast Gainesville area, as an implementing step to carry forward the work of Plan East Gainesville. Staff is exploring the possible purchase of parcels with the goal that the City would prepare requests for proposals for mixed-income residential development and then transfer the properties to private developers for development within established guidelines set forth in the request for proposal. The City would look to the CRA to partner with redevelopment activities along Hawthorne Road and to the school board to partner with short- or long-term improvements to school parcels. Staff will present the various specific aspects of the proposed renaissance initiative after initial consulting work is completed.
For now, one step in the process of laying the groundwork for such an effort is to put in place fundamental site design guidelines for any new commercial, mixed-use or multi-family development within the planning area. The proposed special area plan would be similar to the Traditional City zoning though with somewhat simplified rules and more "relaxed" (slightly further from the street) build-to lines.
Staff has already initiated, and the City Plan Board has already recommended approval for, a special area plan overlay along these lines for the Five Points area, as called for as a specific implementing step in Plan East Gainesville. That will reach the City Commission soon as a petition/ordinance. The proposal now is to initiate a petition to take that further geographically and apply it to the proposed Southeast Gainesville Renaissance Initiative area.
Fiscal Note
None
Recommendation
The City Commission initiate a petition to the City Plan Board to create a special area plan with simple site design rules as an overlay zoning district for the Southeast Gainesville Renaissance Initiative area, to apply to all zoning districts and development types except industrial and single-family development.