Tonight (October 12th) at 5:30 the Planning Commission will hear two rezoning requests in the Northeast Creek basin, a large Industrial Light project proposed\u00a0along the edge of the County around the intersection of Highway 55 and Hopson Road and apartments at the northeast corner of Fayetteville Road and Martin Luther King Jr Parkway. \u00a0I have been paying the most attention to\u00a0the 55-Hopson\u00a0proposal, but I did not\u00a0realize its full\u00a0significance\u00a0until a few days ago, so this post is\u00a0at the last minute.\u00a0 Tonight is not the final hearing.\u00a0 There are or have been some other rezoning requests\u00a0along the Creek this year. \u00a0This\u00a0will be\u00a0an online meeting through Zoom; registration is at:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
zoom.us\/webinar\/register\/WN_Az71ESRRSPumnJMjRXPEMg<\/p>\n\n\n\n
More information about participating: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
durhamnc.gov\/4062\/Participate-in-a-Virtual-Public-Hearing<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The application, referenced below, is available\u00a0in the\u00a0agenda posted at:\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
durhamnc.gov\/AgendaCenter\/Planning-Commission-15 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
See also Durham’s new supplemental Social PinPoint system:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
durham.mysocialpinpoint.com\/land-use\/map#\/sidebar\/tab\/about<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I wrote about this and some other proposals earlier in the year at: <\/p>\n\n\n\n
www.northeastcreek.org\/wordpress\/where-the-red-fire-pink-blows-and-other-campions-in-the-triangle\/ <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the Planning Commission there would be a hearing before the City Council.\u00a0 Below are some comments.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hopson-55 rezoning\u00a0
The staff report incorrectly said this site is in the Neuse River basin, but I think this\u00a0is being\u00a0corrected to the Haw and ultimately Cape Fear basin.\u00a0 Legal definitions must be being used at the bottom of page 4, because there are obviously plants, animals, communities, and ecosystems on the site, since it is a location on the living Earth (though after mass grading the site would like more like a tract on a lifeless celestial body).\u00a0 It is very easy to not find any rare or protected species or historical relevance.\u00a0\u00a0 The report lists many items that might be good to have in the planning process, but then they are rendered useless by saying that they do not apply in the absence of a development plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are references to extending Hopson Road west of 55 on page 32, etc.\u00a0 The rezoning request only covers part of the area discussed at the community meeting, but obviously the applicant must intend to build in the entire area, looking at page 34, etc.\u00a0\u00a0 The clearcutting over the last 10 years from 55 to Grandale leads me to suspect that all of this land is being sold, so does the applicant have plans or know something the public doesn’t know?\u00a0 It’s possible the logging was done so they could then say on page 53 that the communities discussed in the NC Natural Heritage Program reports no longer exist, and without committed elements there are no guarantees about where building would be done on the site.\u00a0 The area north of the powerline was also clearcut, but they say it will not be built upon.\u00a0 When was there a hearing on building a new connecting road from 55 to Grandale?\u00a0 I also heard a rumor late\u00a0last week that the DOT wants to enlarge Grandale.\u00a0 I have since been informed that the Durham-Chapel Hill-Carrboro Comprehensive Transportation Plan calls for a “major thoroughfare” from the Hopson and 55 intersection to Grandale, but nothing is listed in the State Transportation Improvement Program from now to 2033.\u00a0 The NC NHP repeatedly surveyed the public lands along Northeast Creek immediately bordering the proposed rezoning site and recommends that new utility easements not be built\u00a0(Jordan Lake Inventory 1999) and that “Preservation of upland buffers along the edges of the bottomlands should be given a high priority”\u00a0(Durham County\u00a0Inventory 1995). \u00a0It seems like building a major new road would have a worse impact on the environment than new utillity easements and there is already a lot of roadkill on Grandale Road around the bridge over Northeast Creek as it is, especially in late spring\/early summer.\u00a0 When was or will the public given an opportunity to comment on road plans?\u00a0 How much blasting would have to be done to extend Hopson, given that it currently ends at a steep slope,\u00a0on one of the highest hills in the area?\u00a0 Will the DOT\u00a0then want to extend a road across one of the wildest parts of Northeast Creek and the Tobacco Trail to 751?\u00a0 There is already a connecting route from 55 to Grandale, made harder to use when the intersection was moved north, and the area around the old claypit can be accessed from the existing road.
As I said before, the application includes very little information about what is actually planned.\u00a0 At the community meeting\u00a0(see page 41)\u00a0they said the plan was for office-type biomedical buildings, but Industrial Light allows many applications, including recycling centers, warehouses, freight facilities, junkyards, wholesale, etc.\u00a0 It\u00a0is\u00a0possible a junkyard would actually be more environmentally benign than office buildings, parking lots, and lawn.\u00a0 Freight or recycling would probably increase roadkill and litter and\u00a0have other impacts.\u00a0 What would be done to limit harmful chemical releases?\u00a0 Would the buildings be built\u00a0where they would have\u00a0maximum impact on the adjacent gamelands, and Parkwood and Audubon Park would also be impacted since they aren’t that far away?\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What about the impact on hunting?\u00a0 If hunting is limited by building, there\u00a0could be over-population of deer in Parkwood.\u00a0 Wildlife such as turkeys, wood ducks, prothonotary\u00a0warblers,\u00a0beavers (a subject of concern east of Parkwood this year), and possibly otters live adjacent to this site, while further away I saw a breeding female chuck-will’s-widow or whippoorwill, and I thought such birds had been driving out of the Triangle,\u00a0like\u00a0bobwhites.\u00a0\u00a0
Would IL zoning allow greenhouses, under research?\u00a0 I live miles from TW Alexander Drive, but I am\u00a0already impacted by the light pollution from large greenhouses there, along with the new blue-white streetlights installed this\u00a0year.\u00a0 It is less obvious, but I can probably see light pollution from the Southpoint Mall area as well.\u00a0 Light pollution is very obvious when there are low clouds, such as last weekend, but it reflects off dust, etc, and muddies the sky even on clear nights, so the Milky Way, which should be easy to see is barely if at all visible.\u00a0 Closer to the site buildings and parking lots would no doubt be lit all night and there would probably be light trespass from poorly shielded lights into the gameland.\u00a0 If a large greenhouse were built close to Parkwood it would probably be very bright on nearby streets when it is cloudy, and during the winter, even though there is a forested buffer, as happens at the Stonesthrow Apartments, by Burdens Creek.
What about the scientific significance of the claypit?\u00a0 I can’t remember the details now, but I think paleontologists at local universities have excavated significant fossils there.\u00a0 I have found plant fossils elsewhere where the sedimentary bedrock has been exposed a few miles away.\u00a0 The application says there are not\u00a0any steep slopes or wetlands, but is this true of the entire area they want to build on, from 55 to near Grandale Road?\u00a0 The aerial photos show\u00a0water in the old claypit and there are marshes in places under the powerlines, while it seems likely that there would be steep slopes around the claypit and 55.\u00a0 \u00a0
There is a small cemetery southeast of the claypit by the road and it is likely that there are archaeological remains where ancient people could overlook the floodplain and watch for game.\u00a0 There is an old road of some\u00a0near 55, but I don’t know of any ruins there.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0
Even though there is preserved land, development nearby could still cause local extinctions, for example if species are bothered by light, noise, or water\u00a0pollution; needed the upland habitat on private land as well as the public bottomlands; if they need a larger area of forest than just what is preserved; or if they are\u00a0harmed by\u00a0non-native species such as\u00a0cats, dogs, Norway rats, or English ivy\u00a0that could come with increased\u00a0human activity.\u00a0\u00a0
Some but not all of the woods in this area were clearcut over the past 10 years, but young trees have since grown back and species such as deer and red-tailed hawks have probably benefitted, and bobwhites might also like such habitat. Unlike what the\u00a0application says, when I would go by over 10 years ago it seemed like the claypit was surrounded by forest, though it was relatively young, and some remains.
Apparently\u00a0tree planting is a significant way to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as the City of Durham supposedly desires, but Durham probably has fewer trees now than it did in 1995, at least in this section (though the amount of forest is probably greater than when agriculture was more prominent in Durham).\u00a0 Building a new road, instead of using what already exists, and relying on cars,\u00a0would also contribute to climate change.
I’m not necessarily against building something and I actually find new construction interesting, but very little information is being offered,\u00a0what would this project mean for nearby “vacant” land, and suddenly there is talk of a new connecting road and expanding Grandale. I am generally against making Grandale a major road\u00a0and there is already too much roadkill and dangerous conditions for pedestrians and cyclists along Grandale and on Scott King Road, where an elementary school is planned. The speed limit is high, and people speed, coming on to the curved and narrow bridge over the Creek, at one time a one-lane wooden bridge on a long gravel road.\u00a0 Increased traffic might potentially drive off the huge numbers of\u00a0 turkey and black vultures that sometimes roost, though it might increase their food supply. The only benefit is that the risk of people being harassed by over-zealous neighborhood watch types and even deputies while doing legal activities might be reduced, as well as illegal dumping, though littering might increase. It might be good to have better parking by the bridge. On the other hand, given that people like or liked to joyride ATVs in the area, including on the site in question, and it borders parkland, maybe it would become Durham’s next\u00a0Ellis Research Center (on the south side of Ellis Road east of 147),\u00a0which has\u00a0private metal signs saying “No Stopping, No Standing, No Parking”\u00a0along a public road, which reflects badly on Durham and is a threat to the public. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
518 Martin Luther King Jr Parkway<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I am not very familiar with this site except passing by, but it is in the headwaters of Northeast Creek’s north branch and it would be good if woods were preserved, especially along the roads, the Tobacco Trail, and any streams; native plants used in landscaping; light pollution limited, etc. The woods might not be very old, but a rare pink ladyslipper orchid grew in young pinewoods where Woodcroft Parkway was extended across Fayetteville and some species prefer young or otherwise piney woods. There is already a lot of traffic at the intersection to consider and the ATT has crossings in the area. If there are steep slopes, people might throw their trash over the edge if it is made convenient and without consequences for them. It is good that the applicants say they will preserve some existing trees and include a park, though these probably aren’t binding commitments and it would be good to\u00a0keep the trees along\u00a0the roads. The maps show a hill on the site and it might have a good view if cleared, as did the ridge at 54 and Barbee Road, which\u00a0is the watershed\u00a0separating\u00a0the Northeast Creek and Crooked Creek basins.\u00a0 This area has also\u00a0become much more densely built-up in recent years, but much of it is in the Third Fork and Crooked creek basins.\u00a0
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Tonight (October 12th) at 5:30 the Planning Commission will hear two rezoning requests in the Northeast Creek basin, a large Industrial Light project proposed\u00a0along the edge of the County around the intersection of Highway 55 and Hopson Road and apartments at the northeast corner of Fayetteville Road and Martin Luther King Jr Parkway. \u00a0I have … Continue reading 55-Hopson and MLK rezoning hearings at the planning commission tonight<\/span>