Sunday, November 16, 2008
Dear Honorable Mayor Abernathy and City Council Members:
I believe that it is common sense that the proposed Lowe’s Shopping Center should be located on, and not simply near, a highway. We all know how cities develop around such shopping centers—all of us have seen the highway commercial development around Lowe’s in Anderson, Seneca, Easley, Greenville, and elsewhere. Let’s use the highways that we have and keep the residential roads that we have residential.
It is not only common sense. It is indicated in the City of Clemson Comprehensive Plan, which as part of the city planning process described by South Carolina Code of Laws Section 6-29-540 and City Ordinance CC-2004-13, clearly states that such shopping centers should be located “on major arterials and transit routes” (Comprehensive Plan 5.1.1). However, I do not believe that this and other aspects of the Comprehensive Plan, including guidelines for big box stores (Comprehensive Plan 5.1.5), and State Law concerning “Planned Developments” (SC Code 6-29-740), were adequately considered in the City Planning Commission review process.
In conclusion, I believe that the review process to date has been short-sighted—it has failed to consider the consequences and the larger planning principles that are recognized by comprehensive planning and by an extensive body of planning literature. In fact, there is more than fifty years of literature on urban/suburban sprawl (back, for example, to FORTUNE magazine, 1957-58). Unfortunately, these decades of study indicate that the Lowe’s Shopping Center is a classic case study of the way that sprawl develops. In other words, both history and common sense suggest that the current proposal to up-zone the Issaqueena Trail site is not a move in the right direction.
I hope that you will recognize this in your deliberations. I hope that you will have the confidence to recognize that demographic predictions indicate that Clemson will continue to grow steadily over the next decades, and that national retailers will inevitably follow this development, as Lowe’s is already doing. As the beginning of decades of continued growth, this is the time to plan for the future. Short-term thinking will only lead to chaotic, ad hoc development, increased infrastructural costs, traffic congestion, and reduced quality of life. By contrast, a thoughtfully planned city will be a beautiful and charming place that will draw new residents and retailers in numbers that will be unmatched by less well planned and well led communities.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Margaret Thompson sent me this response when I emailed her about my opposition to the Lowe's:
You are a good citizen for standing your ground. I admire that, but I do disagree with you and our entire council has been very upfront for the past year that economic development has been a priority of ours. We spent $88 thousand dollars of the tax payers money to have a study done and all of this has been in the newspaper. I do not know how much Lowe's pays their employees but that is up to an individual to say no if they don't want to work for whatever they pay. Even if we didn't have an economic crisis at this time, I would still vote for Lowe's. I feel Clemson will get the Lowe's at the location on Issaqueena Trail.
If this development will be so great for the economy, then why doesn't she know anything about its practices? And they spent $88,000 in taxpayer money on that study!
Well said. ...Unfortunately this is a state where regression is the norm and Clemson is no different... k
Thank you for your comments.
I would be happy to post the complete correspondence with City Councilwoman Margaret Thompson. It should be noted that she has been a consistent advocate of a big box development on Issaqueena. Thompson has indicated that she regrets losing Walmart to Pickens County and does not want to lose Lowe's.
Personally, I do not believe in economic development at any cost. Nothing changes the fact that Issaqueena Trail is the wrong place for a big box store. The community, both neighbors and the city, should not have to subsidize the development of a regional shopping center with a decreased quality of life (ie, car and truck traffic, noise, future infrastructural costs, sprawl, etc. etc.). There is no such thing as a free lunch.
With that in mind, if one wants to talk about money, what is the cost of sprawl: traffic congestion, decreased property values, and future infrastructural expenses (ie, widening Issaqueena Trail and further damaging this neighborhood)? How much, for example, will homes all along Issaqueena decrease in value? Many people say that they would not have moved into Westcott, Monaco Estates, Camelot, and nearby subdivisions if there was or if they had known this shopping center would be across the street. Future residents will have the same opinion about moving to this part of the city if this shopping center and the development that will follow it is built. No one wants to live next door to shopping centers like this one in Seneca, Easley, and Anderson. The same thing will happen to Issaqueena Trail if we let it.
Moreover, on the subject of studies, how much did it cost to develop the City' Comprehensive Plan--which is now being neglected? The costs of bad planning are enormous, much greater than the benefits of this development. However, if pursued, this development will be a serious setback, perhaps terminal, for thoughtful planning in this city. This city has the opportunity to do better.
Post a Comment