More apartments, townhomes coming to Town of Louisa; County officials consider upgrades as demand for water from Northeast Creek Reservoir grows
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More apartments, townhomes coming to Town of Louisa
More apartments and townhomes are coming to the Town of Louisa.
The Louisa Town Council on Tuesday night approved a pair of developments that are slated to bring more than 300 multi-family dwellings to the town’s eastern end. Both projects tweak previously approved plans by increasing the number of townhomes or apartments, tacking on more acreage and upping the amount of green space.
Council voted 3-2 to approve Quigley Properties’ request to rezone, from Residential General (RG) to Planned Unit Development (PUD), 10.53 acres just west of Jefferson Highway (Route 33) off Pine Ridge Drive, which was previously slated for 36 single-family dwellings.
Quigley plans to combine that property with an already-approved PUD on 11.2 adjacent acres, upping the number of apartments from 60 to 154, trimming the number of single-family homes from 56 to 13, including the rezoned parcel, and increasing the amount of open space from 30 percent of the project site to 53 percent. To make that happen, council agreed to revise the zoning amendment okayed two years ago when it approved Quigley’s original plan.
The project, dubbed Timber Oaks, also includes an 1.18-acre commercial block fronting Route 33 with 11,200 square feet of space for retail, offices or other services.
The commercial component and apartments will be accessed off 33 while the single-family dwellings will be built on two new public roads off Pine Ridge Drive. An emergency access road will connect the commercial and multi-family sections to the single-family component, replacing a public road included in the previous plan.
Timothy Miller, presenting on Quigley’s behalf, said the developer changed its initial plans based on market conditions and to address community concerns about stormwater runoff and flooding.
Beaver Creek, a waterway that runs adjacent to the property, is prone to flooding, sparking concern from neighbors that more rooftops would exacerbate the problem.
Miller emphasized that the 21-acre PUD would include 11.2 acres of green space. Of that about five acres are designated for tree preservation, which Quigley emphasized in its rezoning application would play an important role in mitigating runoff. Miller also said that Quigley shifted its stormwater management features away from Beaver Creek to another portion of the property.
In motioning to approve Timber Oaks, council member John Jerl Purcell IV, by far the youngest elected official in town or county government, said that while he preferred a more diverse mix of housing, he supported the plan mostly because it would provide more opportunities for young people to live in the town.
“It’s very hard to get a home in the Town of Louisa if you are 20 to 30,” Purcell said.
Council then turned its attention to a second Planned Unit Development (PUD) proposed for the Route 33 corridor, green-lighting Pine Ridge Properties’ request to rezone, from Residential General (RG) to PUD, 19.79 acres that straddle Pine Ridge Drive.
The rezoning clears the way for Louisa developers Torrey Williams and Charles J. Miller to build 159 townhomes on the parcels. Council previously approved a special use permit (SUP) for about 15 acres of the project site, which permitted 55 townhomes and 80 apartments. Under the new plan, the developers tacked on five acres and 24 dwellings and converted the apartments to townhomes.
Williams said that he’d worked to improve the project and address community members’ concerns, noting that the new plan has less density and more open space.
He also argued that the project makes sense because the area is zoned for residential development and Louisa County’s 2040 Comprehensive Plan targets property around the town as a designated growth area.
“It’s natural that this is where the growth will come. It’s natural that you would find places to build dense housing [here] if the intention is to keep the county rural,” Williams said.
After a brief discussion with the applicant mostly about stormwater and traffic, council voted 4-1 to approve Pine Ridge Properties’ proposal. Purcell, Sylvia Rigsby and Jessi Lassiter supported both projects. Danny Carter joined the majority in voting for Pine Ridge but opposed Timber Oaks. Vicky Harte, an outspoken critic of high-density development in the town who frequently sounds the alarm about stormwater runoff and flooding, voted against both proposals.
While most council members responded favorably to the projects, some neighbors took a different view, urging council to reject the developers’ changes.
About a dozen residents weighed in during a pair of public hearings—many from the neighboring Tanyard subdivision—with most expressing concerns about the sharp increase in high-density development in the town.
Several speakers said they aren’t against growth but prefer a more measured approach that accounts for its impact on county and town services, including schools, fire and EMS, and cops, and local infrastructure like roads, public utilities and stormwater controls.
Tanyard resident Manning Woodward, who represents the Louisa District on the Louisa County Board of Supervisors, urged town officials to, as he put it, “slow down, take some breaths” before approving more units.
Woodward voiced particular concern about the developments’ impact on traffic and county services. Citing an estimate included in Pine Ridge’s proposal, he said the development would add more than 1,000 vehicle trips per day to the area. Coupled with other approved projects, Woodward projected that the number of additional vehicle trips each day along the Route 33 corridor would soar to more than 4,000.
“VDOT moves very slowly as y’all well know. As the traffic problems continue to increase, [finding solutions] is not going to get done quickly. A traffic circle is not going to go in at what I still call the old Amoco probably in the next 10 years, but it’s needed today,” Woodward said.
He added that the developments would bring dozens of new students to Louisa County Public Schools and county taxpayers would be on the hook to educate them.
“I know the town doesn’t have to pay [for] that. But, by golly, we taxpayers have to pay it because we all pay county taxes,” he said.
Rob Woolfolk, whose family lives along Beaver Creek just outside the town, said that he isn’t against growth, but has concerns about how stormwater runoff from continued development would impact his property.
“Every time a rooftop goes up, a place gets paved over, we’re up to a decent thunderstorm now, and our roads are flooded. We’ve put in larger pipes. We’ve put in more pipes, and it just keeps getting worse. I’m not really against development. You have to have progress. However, you have to have sensible progress,” he said.
Representatives from Pine Ridge and Timber Oaks sought to minimize the traffic impact. Based on a traffic study conducted on the developer’s behalf, Miller said that Timber Oaks’ new plan would generate slightly less traffic than its previous proposal. He attributed the decrease to fewer single-family homes. Williams said, based on a traffic study for his development, VDOT hadn’t deemed any significant road improvements necessary.
Both developers also emphasized changes to their plans to address stormwater runoff. Williams insisted that flooding along Beaver Creek is a result of development that took place prior to implementation of the state’s current stormwater regulations and that his project would ensure that less runoff comes from the property.
Beyond overarching concerns, neighbors also leveled specific criticism of each proposal.
Tanyard resident Larry Kavanagh said that council should postpone its vote on Timber Oaks until it had more details about what the development would look like. He said he’s worried about its impact on the Tanyard subdivision and golf course.
“[This plan] is about 10 or 12 pages of maps that show how they are going to fit this stuff in, but not one page shows what all this stuff is going to look like. There’s nothing that says these will be high-quality apartments, nothing that says they will be pretty. It only says that there will be this many of them on that space, and I think that’s a terrible thing. Why do you need to rush into approval of a plan when you don’t know what you’re getting, ” Kavanagh said.
Miller responded that design details would be worked out in the site plan process after approval of the rezoning, and the town’s planning commission would get a chance to approve the developer’s final plan.
He also noted that Quigley had taken steps to protect Tanyard, pointing to a pair of proffers attached to the rezoning. One proffer bars access to the development via a deeded right-of-way off Barnstormer Circle in Tanyard. In the other, Quigley agrees to never dedicate right-of-way along Pine Ridge Drive that would allow it to extend to Tanyard.
A couple speakers criticized Pine Ridge Properties’ request for a residential-only PUD, arguing that the zoning designation offers developers the ability to build more units, but requires something in return, usually commercial development and amenities.
“It seems the only advantage for changing it to a PUD is for the developer. In the past, when the town allowed a PUD, the developers have included commercial aspects. I see there is only one acre shown as a recreational area. This project, reaching 159 units, will bring nearly 500 residents based on three people per unit. No plans for a clubhouse, no dog parks, no swimming pool, no playground, no basketball courts or other amenities that you would expect of a PUD,” Tanyard resident Debbie Woodward said.
Williams said the development team had intentionally decided to exclude commercial development and focus on residential, noting that more rooftops are needed to attract and sustain high-quality businesses. In addition, he said that while his new plan adds units, it also adds acreage, lowering the project’s density from 8.9 dwelling units per acre to 8.03.
With respect to amenities, Williams told council that he’s committed to building a playground and a dog park.
More residential development in the works
Aside from Timber Oaks and Pine Ridge Properties’ plan to bring 326 dwellings to the Route 33 corridor, more residential development is in the works for the town.
Last year, council approved Louisa Heights, LLC’s request to build a PUD on about 21 acres on the other side of 33 along the town’s eastern border.
Dubbed Laurel Ridge, the project is expected to include 156 dwellings, including apartments and attached single-family homes, according to a project narrative.
In a brief report at Tuesday’s meeting, Paul Snyder, who serves as the town’s project manager, said that the plan has undergone some changes since its initial submission. But he added that he hasn’t had any recent contact with the developers.
Beyond the already-approved plans, council, at either its September or October meeting, will consider East Coast Excavation’s request for a special use permit (SUP) to build 42 townhomes on a 5.5 commercially zoned acres adjacent to Spring Oak at Louisa, an assisted living community at the town’s western edge.
Council was expected to consider the project, dubbed Spring Oak Townhomes, at Tuesday’s meeting, but deferred the public hearing at the applicant’s request. Snyder said he doesn’t expect any significant changes to the plan, noting the developer needed more time to answer questions raised at the planning commission’s meeting.
In late July, the town’s planning commission voted to recommend that council deny the SUP. Several speakers, including John Gibson, an attorney for the assisted living facility, raised concerns about increased traffic. Gibson also questioned whether the developer had the right to access the property via a 50-foot right-of-way adjacent to the facility.
Snyder also reported that the owners of Jouett Square, an apartment complex off Lyde Avenue, contacted the town about a 162-unit expansion. The project would also include retail space along Route 208 south of Tractor Supply. Snyder said he expects to receive a formal application from the developer by the end of next month.
Significant residential growth in Town of Louisa at odds with goals of some county leaders
Council’s openness to approving more rooftops comes amid burgeoning concerns about residential growth among some county leaders.
While Woodward spoke in opposition to both developments in his capacity as a town resident and neighbor, he addressed council earlier in the meeting as the town’s representative on the board of supervisors.
During those comments, Woodward noted that county leaders had recently added a public facilities chapter to its Comprehensive Plan, which provides tools for quantifying the impact of different types of development on county services. He provided handouts to council that broke down the fiscal impact of residential development on schools, fire and EMS, parks and recreations and other services.
Woodward said the county is eager to help the town utilize these tools as it plans for the future.
“The county is more than willing…to help y’all in any way they can if you want to update your Comp Plan with any kind of things like this or anything else,” he said.
No one on council publicly expressed interest in taking Woodward up on that offer.
As residential growth has exploded in the county—its population now exceeds 40,000 and, since 2020, it ranks as the third-fastest growing locality in the state, according to the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center—county leaders are exploring ways to rein in new rooftops.
In the coming months, the county will begin a five-year update to its Comp Plan and several supervisors have suggested that finding ways to slow residential growth will be a key focus of the process and changes to county code that flow from it.
While board members haven’t explicitly discussed what those changes might look like, they’ve previously considered significantly expanding the minimum lot size that’s required to build a single-family home in parts of the county.
During a rewrite of the zoning code in 2021, supervisors considered upping the minimum lot size to 3.5 acres in general agricultural (A-2) zoning. They instead opted to maintain the 1.5-acre minimum already in place and raise the minimum in residential zoning from just under an acre to an acre and a half.
It’s unclear how effective raising the minimum lot size would be in addressing residential growth especially given the number of buildable lots in the county and the large-scale residential development already approved but not yet constructed.
At a board meeting earlier this year, Jackson District Supervisor Toni Williams, whose son, Torrey, is spearheading multi-family developments in the towns of Louisa and Mineral, referenced the Weldon Cooper Center’s estimates and said that the influx of new residents isn’t sustainable.
He made clear that he’s ready to enact measures that tamp down residential growth, telling his colleagues, “the time for change is now.”
“This is a problem county-wide and we are going to have to deal with it. We are going to have to come up with some solutions for [it] and it is going to infringe upon the property rights of people when we get a solution,” Williams said.
Like Woodward, Williams emphasized the impact of residential development on services, arguing its causing the county’s budget to balloon. He pointed to figures provided by staff, which suggest the county pulls in less than $3,000 in tax revenue a year from the average starter home, but spends $9,000 a year to educate one child living in that home.
Regardless of what county leaders do, they have little control over decisions about development in the town—a reality made clear at Tuesday’s meeting.
Woodward told council that one of his goals when he joined the board last January was to improve the relationship between the town and the county. But that task could prove tricky as leaders at both levels of government appear to have very different philosophies when it comes to residential growth.
County officials consider upgrades as demand for water from Northeast Creek Reservoir grows
Amid a drought-stricken summer, Louisa County officials are considering upgrades to support the growing demand for water from the Northeast Creek Reservoir.
Louisa County Water Authority (LCWA) General Manager Pam Baughman said in an email to Engage Louisa last week that the county and authority are looking into increasing the reservoir’s capacity by “raising” it as much as six feet. She also said officials are considering piping water from the James River to serve customers in central Louisa.
Baughman said the county is in the early stages of exploring what she termed “incremental upgrades” to its infrastructure “to ensure there is enough water for everyone.”
“Decisions on who, what, where, when or how have not occurred or been fully vetted to date,” she said.
The county’s interest in increasing the water supply in central Louisa comes as demand for water from the Northeast Creek Reservoir is expected to surge over the next 15 years, largely due to Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) plans to build two data center campuses in the county’s Technology Overlay District.
The campuses, slated for 150 acres adjacent to the North Anna Power Station and part of a 1,444-acre tract just south of the reservoir, are expected to host at least 17 data centers, critical pieces of 21st century infrastructure that house computer equipment that keeps the internet running. Known for their insatiable demand for both water and power, the facilities will rely on raw water from the reservoir to cool the servers and networking equipment inside.
Louisa County has agreed to build a pair of raw water lines and related infrastructure to serve the campuses with AWS covering the cost, per water service agreements inked between the county and the company last December.
The towns of Louisa and Mineral are also anticipating significant residential growth in the coming years with hopes that more commercial growth will follow. Over the last two years, the Louisa Town Council has approved more than 450 new townhomes and apartments on the town’s eastern edge and developers have either applied for or are preparing to apply to build another 200-plus multi-family dwellings in other parts of the town.
Louisa County Economic Development Director Andy Wade, who played a key role in bringing AWS to the county, has said at numerous public meetings that there’s plenty of water in the reservoir to serve the data center campuses, meet the needs of current customers and support future growth.
“We have a ton of capacity left in the reservoir,” Wade told supervisors at their December 18 meeting when they approved the water service agreements.
Wade pointed to a capacity study conducted last year by the engineering firm Johnson, Mirmiran & Thompson (JMT), which, he said, determined the reservoir has a safe yield of 3.2 million gallons per day.
Wade said that, on average, the AWS campuses would use about 620,000 gallons of raw water daily at full buildout and the reservoir’s current users withdraw about 300,000 gallons per day and 500,000 gallons at peak demand.
Wade noted that the Northeast Creek Water Treatment Plant has the capacity to treat one million gallons of water a day. If all that capacity was used, the reservoir would still have a 1.57-million-gallon safe yield buffer, he said.
In conducting the analysis, Wade said that JMT “modeled every day from 1980 to December 31 of 2022” including a period of significant drought in the early 2000s. He said that a previous capacity study conducted in 1980 when the reservoir went in service set its safe yield at 2.77 million gallons daily.
While Wade has emphasized there’s adequate water in the reservoir based on AWS’s projected average daily withdrawal, a company representative told the planning commission last year that its data centers could use as much 7.2 million gallons per day at peak demand. Wade has said that “peak demand” refers only to the hottest days of summer, noting the centers rely on ambient air temperature for cooling in winter.
But hot summer days are also when other customers use the most water and the likeliest time for extreme drought.
This summer’s moderate to severe drought has impacted the local water supply and raised concerns among some residents about the reservoir’s capability of meeting future demand, particularly as droughts and heat waves intensify because of climate change.
In mid-July, LCWA instituted mandatory water restrictions for all its customers due to, as Baughman put it, “excessive heat for an extended period and no rainfall”. Those restrictions included limits on outside water use including barring people from washing their automobiles and using sprinklers.
On the heels of significant rainfall in early to mid-August, LCWA last week eased those restrictions, permitting customers to freely use outside water with the caveat that those with odd numbered addresses limit outside water use to odd days and those with even numbered addresses limit use to even days.
In addition to customers in central Louisa, who rely on the reservoir, the authority serves residents and businesses at Zion Crossroads and a small number of customers at Lake Anna, all of whom tap groundwater-based systems.
Baughman said that when the restrictions were implemented the reservoir “was low for the time of year, but not critically.” She said the seven production wells serving Zion Crossroads were “substantially low for the time of year,” noting that, per its legal counsel, the authority can’t impose restrictions on only one part of its service area.
“Out of an abundance of caution and to protect our resources, restrictions were imposed. The restrictions have provided an opportunity for the resources to recover from the extremely dry start to the summer,” Baughman said.
Last week, county officials celebrated a significant milestone that’s expected to play a key role in addressing their water woes at Zion. The James River Water Authority (JRWA), a joint effort between Louisa and Fluvanna counties, officially broke ground on the final leg of the long-awaited James River Water Project, a 17-mile pipeline that will channel millions of gallons of water from the river to LCWA’s water treatment plant at Ferncliff then on to development along the Interstate 64 corridor including at Zion and the Shannon Hill Regional Business Park.
Per an inter-jurisdictional agreement, the localities will split the cost of the project’s final leg—expected to top $45 million—including a nearly four-mile stretch of water line, a submerged intake and pump station. They’ll also split the water the infrastructure draws from the river.
JRWA holds a withdrawal permit from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, allowing it to pull up to 8.57 million gallons of water per day from the James based on a tiered allocation structure. The structure allows Louisa to use water in its designated growth areas along the I-64 corridor including Zion, Ferncliff, Shannon Hill and Gum Spring. It also permits water usage in central Louisa and at Lake Anna.
Some of that water could potentially travel from the James to central Louisa based on one plan under consideration by county officials, according to Baughman. Delivering that water to the area would require construction of another lengthy pipeline, covering some 15 to 20 miles.
Baughman said county officials are also considering raising the level of the reservoir to increase its storage capacity.
“LCWA owns 6 feet above the standing pool of water at the Northeast Creek Reservoir. It can be raised that much, providing additional water storage. Incremental increases up to 6 feet can be obtained,” she said.
When asked if AWS would pay for a water line to Ferncliff or Shannon Hill to deliver water to central Louisa or cover the cost of increasing the capacity of the reservoir, Baughman said that county officials haven’t determined how they’d pay for potential upgrades.
“Several large projects are being considered in the Towns of Louisa and Mineral, Amazon is not the only project in the works. How those upgrades will be paid for will be decided as we move forward. We don’t know at this point if rates will be adjusted to pay for them or if funding opportunities exist or how that will be sorted out,” she said.
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Excellent, thorough reporting. As a newcomer to Louisa County, I'm finding valuable resources and information through Engage Louisa. Thank you.