From yesterday’s DP article by Jessica Kitchin –

A look at old maps of the U.S. 29 corridor north of Charlottesville underscores the amount of development it has undergone in recent years. What was secluded in the 1980s has become a bustling assortment of stoplights, strip malls and parking lots.

That urbanization and an intensive effort to better plan the developing areas of the county have led local officials to focus on the often-derided highway.

Better late than never. The Places29 project continues in the same vein as the Crozet Master Plan and the equally belated Pantops Master Plan.

From the same article –

“The Places29 study is really a flagship model for a comprehensive approach that incorporates transportation and land-use issues,” said Harrison Rue, executive director of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission. “The core of this study is to get people from the city, county and state to look at those issues together.”

It’s a start. At least part of the focus is from a regional point of view. Land use decisions affect more than the adjoining landowners.

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