02/25/2003 Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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last time they reviewed the plan they took chapters at a time, usually two at a time, and went through it. He asked Mr. Conway if he believes that is helpful. 1VIr. Conway said the demographics will change soinewhat but the city is about 85% solid of what it was ten years ago. He said the Vision 2000 plan is very important because then they would know what other people were thinking and by incorporating those ideas, they would be bringing them on board and creating a ground swell. The more force you have behind these things, the easier it will be to sell it to others. 10'Ir. Spald'ang asked if he believes they should take specific items such as elder care and elderly housing and see where that can fit in. They could then move on to commercial. He said the Vision 2000 group was interested in having hubs, commercial hubs for particular areas. He mentioned for example, Clague and Lorain, Coluinbia and Lorain, Stearns and Lorain. Mr. Conway said it makes sense. The "big box people" who coine from out of town do not want to go beyond Stearns. They want to be in the center where all the action is. Creating a hub, maybe a grocery store, keeps the people from the west end going to Midway Mall and keeps them in town to get their groceries. He said you have to define the hubs and have people who know retail. 1VIr. Spalding suggested taking specific projects or items and analyzing those as a start. He mentioned Crocker-Stearns, Parcel E, the elderly situation, and green space. Mr. Conway said if they start with specific issues and get input from others, when the city has a planner in place they will be able to give him some direction on where to get going and he can direct them on how to get there. Mrs. Hoff-Smith said it would be very nice to see updated demographics even though the population might be somewhat the same. The age differences in the population will vary. She would also like to see the Vision 2000 report since it may give them some guidance on what is important to the city, aside from what the board's hot buttons are. She suggested looking at the demographics and then looking at issues of importance, and then taking a look at the big picture. Mrs. O'Rourke said it is only right to attack the items right now that are important such as elderly care and green space. She agrees completely with what the planner said but we can't do it and forget about what is already here in the plan because some of that needs to be fixed too. She said a lot of material will not change but it needs to be looked at. She likes the hub idea. She wondered if it will get rid of the strip inalls and "pieces/parts" along Lorain. They will have to figure out a way to work them into what is planned later. She said she knows the Crocker-Stearns project has been on the books for quite a while and she's thought about how handy it will be, but she never thought of it as separating the city until tonight. She thought if anything it would draw people to the city and would help build up the west end. Her fear is it would be retail out that way. Mr. Koeth said the key is what will be at the other end of it. Mr. Conway said the original intent of Crocker-Stearns is to give a western relief to the traffic. 10'Ir. Lasko said that by its definition this is an opportunity to start from a big picture and work down and ultimately tie it back into this plan as it exists right now. His concern is you don't start at the bottom of the funnel and work up to the top. This is their opportunity to start at the top end of the funnel and gather as inuch information, as many concepts as possible and then refine them down to the point where they make suggestions to the original document. He agrees that this is the opportunity to get away from determining whether or not columns should be brick or painted, or how many exit doors there should be in a building, and to look at the concepts. He said it is like a board of directors, you set the tone and the philosophy and the execution of that theory will be left to a later date. Mr. O'Malley said the law prohibits arbitrary and capricious land use classification in our zoning code. The law contemplates a comprehensive land use plan as the foundation for rational zoning. The goal is to support the zoning or rezoning of land that we can defend in court. The demographics suggest certain things to us in terms of what the trends are. We are looking to put into place zoning that can be defended and will encourage economic development in certain directions. We are trying to steer it and build it up. We are also trying to restrict it. He said one of the biggest recommendations that he could interpret from the 1992 master plan was that North Olmsted has a glut of retail zoning and every parcel of land on Lorain Road west of Stearns is zoned for retail. If you don't down zone it soon you will have the Crocker-Stearns extension which will make that area prone to strip center development. If you don't want a strip center on Lorain west 4