Chapter Summary

This chapter outlines Albemarle County's strategic approach to managing land in the county's expansive Rural Area, which covers approximately 689 square miles or approximately 95% of the county’s total land area. The Rural Area is characterized by its diverse geography, including valleys and mountain ridges. It is crucial for preserving our local natural environment, supporting agriculture, and protecting various historic, scenic, and cultural resources.

Key Objectives and Strategies

• Primary Land Uses: The chapter emphasizes the importance of land conservation to protect the natural environment and use land for agriculture and forestry. Land conservation benefits urban and rural residents with essential benefits like clean water and biodiversity.
• Reduction of Residential Development: Residential development in the Rural Area has significantly declined compared with the Development Areas—from 60% of all new units in 1971 to just 16% in 2023—due to effective land conservation policies in the Rural Area and growth directing into the designated Development Areas.
• Rural Communities: With about 43% of the county's population residing in the Rural Area, the chapter highlights the necessity of providing equitable access to essential services such as healthcare, public safety, and community facilities. It supports small-scale businesses and local markets in existing rural communities to meet daily needs.
• Land Use Planning: The proposed Rural Area Land Use Plan (Action 1.1) aims to recognize the diverse needs within the Rural Area rather than applying a uniform approach. This plan will include identifying conservation priorities and focus areas.
• Conservation Efforts: Approximately 25% of the Rural Area is protected by conservation easements. The chapter calls for updates to land conservation programs to support lower-income landowners better and enhance easement monitoring efforts.
• Adaptive Reuse of Structures: This chapter recommends encouraging the adaptive reuse of existing buildings for small-scale businesses and services in existing rural communities. Adaptive reuse supports the County’s Climate Action Plan by reusing existing structures and materials and reducing the distance surrounding rural residents need to travel for daily needs.
• Interchange Development: The chapter recommends further study of two rural interstate interchanges, prioritizing Exit 124 at Shadwell. Potential development around rural interstate interchanges could facilitate local food systems (e.g., food processing and distribution) and job opportunities while ensuring compatibility with rural land use goals.

The strategies outlined in this chapter prioritize land conservation, promote equitable access to community services, and support the Growth Management Policy to protect the Rural Area’s natural, historic, cultural, and scenic resources.

Chapter Summary

This chapter outlines Albemarle County's plan for land use, development, and quality of life in the Development Areas through 2044, focusing on housing choice, walkability, and accommodating projected growth while preserving the Rural Area. Here’s a summary of the draft document:

Overview of Growth Management

• Growth Management Policy (GMP): Established in 1971, this policy aims to protect the Rural Area while concentrating residential and business development in designated Development Areas. It is more cost-effective and efficient to provide public services and infrastructure such as public water, sewer, and multimodal transportation infrastructure to denser and connected development.
• Population Projections: As of mid-2023, Albemarle County has a population of approximately 115,676, with over half living in Development Areas. By 2044, the population is expected to grow by about 31,000 people, with plans to accommodate most of this growth in the Development Areas.

Vision for the Development Areas

The vision for the Development Areas is a vibrant urban environment with features such as pedestrian-friendly designs, mixed-use developments, and interconnected streets.

Objectives for the Development Areas

• Increase the use of infill, higher density development, adaptive reuse, and redevelopment in the Development Areas.
• Increase the number of jobs and housing units in designated Activity and Employment Centers.
• Invest in existing neighborhoods in the Development Areas with increased connectivity and equitable access to Activity Centers, parks, open space, community facilities and services, and infrastructure improvements that prioritize under-served communities.
• Increase tree coverage in the Development Areas, prioritizing neighborhoods with tree coverage below the County's Development Areas average tree coverage and neighborhoods with significant impervious surface.

Defining Development Areas

• Development Areas: These are specific areas within the county designed for higher-density and mixed-use developments. The aim is to utilize public infrastructure efficiently and create livable spaces while protecting natural, historic, scenic, and cultural resources.
• Utilization Review: Starting in 2026, the County will conduct biennial reviews to assess how well the Development Areas are accommodating projected growth and achieving the vision and objectives for the Development Areas.

Land Use Tools

The plan employs several tools to guide development, along with the Actions:

1. Future Land Use Categories: These define the types of residential, non-residential, recreation, and conservation land uses encouraged for future development, redevelopment, and conservation throughout the county. Each property in the county is assigned a land use category. Categories include primarily residential, mixed-use, commercial and employment, public/recreation, and rural/conservation.
2. Future Land Use Map (FLUM): This map visually represents where the future land use categories have been applied.
3. Community Design Guidelines: These guidelines encourage connected and mixed-use development with access to open and recreational spaces.
4. Activity and Employment Centers: Designated locations to foster mixed-use developments and job creation.

In summary, in coordination with the other Comprehensive Plan chapters, this chapter presents a comprehensive strategy for managing growth in Albemarle County while encouraging high-quality and connected development. The emphasis is on creating vibrant neighborhoods offering diverse housing options and amenities while protecting the Rural Area's natural, historic, scenic, and cultural resources.

Activity Centers are places with various businesses, services, and housing (now or in the future) where we can gather, shop, stroll, work, and meet our daily needs. They can be small or large—a neighborhood corridor or a downtown. Ideally, walking, biking, and transit are the main ways people get around in an Activity Center. There are four draft activity center place types that range in scale: Local, Community, Employment, and Regional Centers.

The purpose of Activity Centers is to promote density within the Development Areas, help prioritize public projects, encourage redevelopment of underutilized areas, and improve coordination between land use and transportation planning. Higher density development makes multimodal transportation, especially transit, more cost-effective and feasible.

The updated Comprehensive Plan proposes to consolidate the 50 centers that are currently designated across the five Area Plans (Places29, Southern and Western, Pantops, Crozet, and Village of Rivanna) into 30 Activity Centers. Many of the current 50 centers are small and not currently or expected to be mixed-use. These 30 Activity Centers would update and replace the 50 centers in the Area Plans when the AC44 Comprehensive Plan is adopted. This would create a consistent set of center place types across the Area Plans and better focus future investments and projects.

Types of Activity Centers

Local Centers

Local Centers are intended to provide smaller-scale areas of activity that support surrounding neighborhoods. They may not necessarily have a more intense ‘core’ area (like Community and Regional Centers), as they generally serve a smaller area than the other types of Centers.

KEY FEATURES BUILDING HEIGHTS UP TO 4 STORIES ACTIVE GROUND-STORY USES WITH WINDOWS SMALL CIVIC AND OPEN SPACES, SUCH AS SMALL PLAZAS AND POCKET PARKS BICYCLE AND PEDESTRIAN CONNECTIONS ON-STREET OR BACK-OF-BUILDING PARKING

Community Centers

Community Centers are intended to serve as a focal point for commercial and cultural activities that are accessible by a variety of transportation options for surrounding neighborhoods and areas.

KEY FEATURES BUILDING HEIGHT FROM 2 TO 6 STORIES ACTIVE GROUND-STORY USES WITH WINDOWS PUBLIC CIVIC AND OPEN SPACES, SUCH AS PLAZAS, COMMUNITY GARDENS, AND NATURAL AREAS TRANSIT STOPS, WIDE SIDEWALKS, BICYCLE CONNECTIONS STRUCTURED OR BACK-OF-BUILDING PARKING

Employment Centers

Employment Centers are intended to serve as areas that support economic development goals and employment-generating uses. Employment Centers typically contain a high concentration of areas with Office/R&D/Flex/Light Industrial or Industrial uses.

Limited locations are designated for primary employment in the Development Areas (the Office/Flex/Light Industrial/Research + Development and Industrial land use categories). An economic development analysis that was done as part of the 2022 Land Use Buildout Analysis found that only 39 Development Areas parcels could support significant non-residential development within an 18-month timeframe that would be attractive to job-creating land uses. The report recommended that designating employment uses be reviewed with Area Plan updates to confirm that they align with the location and infrastructure needs of the County’s targeted economic sectors.

KEY FEATURES BUILDING HEIGHT FROM 2 TO 6 STORIES SAFE CONNECTIONS FOR WALKING AND BIKING STRUCTURED OR BACK-OF-BUILDING PARKING VERTICAL OR HORIZONTAL MIXED-USE INDUSTRIAL USES INSIDE OF BUILDINGS

Regional Centers

Regional Centers are intended to create community focal points with high-density, compact, mixed-use development patterns. They should be vibrant urban areas with goods, services, and entertainment.

KEY FEATURES BUILDING HEIGHT FROM 3 TO 8 STORIES ACTIVE GROUND-STORY USES WITH WINDOWS LARGE PUBLIC CIVIC AND OPEN SPACES, SUCH AS LARGE PLAZAS, AMPHITHEATERS, ATHLETIC FIELDS, AND COMMUNITY GARDENS FREQUENT TRANSIT STOPS, WIDE SIDEWALKS, HIGH BICYCLE CONNECTIVITY STRUCTURED PARKING STRONGLY ENCOURAGED

Additional Resources:

• Posters from the 10/30/24 Community Check-In

Today, land in Albemarle County is used in various ways, including for houses, businesses, offices, industry, parks, farms, and land conservation. The type of development, amenity, or protection of a property is referred to as its ‘land use.’ For example, a property with an apartment building would have a residential land use.

Since the Comprehensive Plan is a guiding document for our community’s future, it focuses on future land uses, using both future land use categories and a Future Land Use Map (FLUM). Future land use categories provide a guiding vision for a property's future use. The Future Land Use Map shows how the future land use categories are applied. The FLUM depicts how an area should look and feel in the future; however, it does not necessarily represent what it is like today.

The FLUM guides development and informs land use decisions. The rezoning and special use permit review process includes comparing a development application with the recommended future land uses per the Comp Plan.

The updated Comprehensive Plan proposes consolidating the 20+ land use categories designated across the five Area Plans (Places29, Southern and Western, Pantops, Crozet, and Village of Rivanna) to 11 standard categories. Many of the 20+ current categories are very similar with overlapping recommendations. These 11 standard categories and their designation on the FLUM would update and replace the 20+ categories in the Area Plans when the AC44 Comprehensive Plan is adopted. Several ‘legacy’ categories would remain in their respective Area Plans. The standard 11 categories will be applied with future Area Plan updates.

FUTURE LAND USE CATEGORIES

FUTURE LAND USE MAP (DRAFT)

Additional Resources:

• Future Land Use Overview poster from the 10/30/24 Community Check-In
• Comparing Current Comprehensive Plan and AC44 Draft Future Land Use Maps