By Howard Packowitz
NORMAL – A plan guiding land use decisions in Normal through the year 2040 will require an overhaul of the town’s zoning code, according to a long-time staffer, and yet he says the town government has received very little feedback from developers and other stakeholders.
The comprehensive plan that was two years in the making won the approval Thursday night of Normal’s Planning Commission.
The plan calls for higher density developments to accomplish the goal of making neighborhoods more compact, connected, and complete.
The town’s inspections director, Greg Troemel, said developers have yet to speak out about the plan.
“If we were doing this 12, 15 years ago – a plan of this magnitude and something this substantial – there would be a lot of people. There would be attorneys and developers and builders, and that kind of thing,” said Troemel.
“It’s just at a very different time right now,” Troemel added.
Town Planner Mercy Davison said the town is not trying to force change that isn’t already happening.
“If you think back to the last five or six years with development slowing down so much, employment figures changing, and the kinds of people coming in and out of town, we’ve had developers coming to us now for years to ask to amend their plans to make them a little denser, to make the lots a little smaller,” said Davison.
“We hear from them all the time ‘when are you going to get the (Constitution Trail) closer to this development?'”
Local planners said they’re trying to balance regulation, and at the same time allow developers the flexibility to come up with creative projects.
The McLean County Regional Planning Commission helped draw up the comprehensive plan, which will be presented to the town council for a vote at its November 20 meeting.
Howard Packowitz can be reached at [email protected]
