v Protecting Sensitive Environmental Areas and Significant Open Space
v Directing Development Away from Sensitive Coastal Resources
The long-term protection of sensitive coastal areas can only be achieved by redirecting development pressures from significant coastal environments to those areas of the coastal already impacted by development. By concentrating new development in areas previously impacted areas, the cumulative impact on the health of Virginia’s coasts can be minimized while still providing all of the amenities required by modern society.
The correlation between increasing impervious surface and decreasing aquatic health is widely recognized in the scientific community. The watersheds of Virginia’s coastal zone range from nearly 100% to nearly pristine with no impervious cover. Therefore, the central principal of any coastal protection strategy is the identification of those watersheds that are relatively pristine (less than 10% impervious cover) and to attempt to maintain most of them in an undeveloped state. The companion principal is that watersheds with impervious cover of more than 10 percent should absorb the majority of coastal growth over the coming decades [1] .
The foundations for effective regional planning and cooperation already exist in many regions of Virginia in the form of Planning District Commissions, Water and Sewer Utility Commissions, and Tributary Strategy teams organized by the Department of Conservation and Recreation for each of the major river basins in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
Protecting Sensitive Environmental Areas and Significant Open Space
Regionally significant environmental features and significant open space can provide substantial benefits to numerous smaller communities and thus are best managed at a regional scale. The economic and environmental productivity of extensive forests, wetlands, healthy estuaries, and productive agricultural lands can be degraded by peripheral suburban development continually encroaching on these lands or, perhaps worse, development fragmenting these lands. Forest and habitat fragmentation can drastically reduce the natural and economic value of these lands at a rate disproportional to the actual amount of land converted to suburban uses. The Dragon Run Special Area Management Plan is one example of the type of multi-jurisdiction coordination necessary throughout Virginia to protect significant critical areas and open space along Virginia’s coasts.
Case Study: Dragon Run Special Area Management Plan(Adapted from Dragon Run Steering Committee, 2003) |
As one of the Chesapeake Bay watershed’s most pristine waterways, the spring-fed Dragon Run flows forty miles along and through nontidal and tidal cypress swamps situated in portions of Essex, King and Queen, Middlesex, and Gloucester Counties. The Dragon Run plays a central role in the Middle Peninsula’s culture and identity. Natural resource management - forestry and farming - have been the bedrock of the watershed’s economy. These land uses, together with extensive swamps and unique natural resources, are the main reasons that the Dragon Run remains wild and secluded. The Dragon Run’s unique character evokes strong feelings in both long-time residents and first-time visitors alike to protect the pristine watershed. Yet, opinions differ about how to address the threats of encroaching development and habitat fragmentation. An innate difference in point of view between property rights advocates and conservationists centers on how to maintain a pristine watershed into the future. Yet, substantial common ground exists for proactively preserving the Dragon Run for future generations that safeguards both natural resources and traditional uses of the land and water, including the property rights of landowners. The Dragon Run Watershed Special Area Management Plan (SAMP), a partnership between the DEQ Virginia Coastal Program and the Dragon Run Steering Committee of the Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission, is designed to address both the differences of opinion and the common ground that exist concerning the future of the watershed. The Steering Committee believes that the best approach is to bring stakeholders to the table for proactive discussions of the issues. The Steering Committee and its Advisory Group, representing a broad cross-section of the community, have proactively developed a mission, goals, objectives, and action plans to address the priority issues facing the Dragon Run. The management plan for the Dragon Run watershed represents a body of work by citizens, stakeholders, and local leaders to achieve a common vision for the future – the preservation of the traditional uses and unique resources in the pristine Dragon Run. This is an example of how localities can make a difference by bringing the environmental and business sectors together. |
Directing Development Away from Sensitive Coastal Resources
There are several tools available to local, regional, and state government to help encourage development where it will have the least impact on coastal resources. Carefully controlling where and when development occurs can not only protect sensitive environmental areas, but can ensure the most efficient use of municipal infrastructure investment (roads, stormwater, sewer, water, mass transit) – thus helping to minimize the tax burden on local residents.
The timing and location of new development can be directed through local comprehensive plans, zoning and subdivision ordinances, and capital investment plans. These land use tools can designate urban growth boundaries, target development areas, and require the careful coordination of land use and infrastructure investment. Virginia Beach’s “Green Line,” originally adopted to address infrastructure imbalances in the city’s development pattern, has become an effective tool for concentrating new development in already impacted coastal watersheds.
Case Study: Virginia Beach’s Green Line (Adapted from City of Virginia Beach, 2003) |
The Virginia Beach Green Line was first established in 1979 to address a significant imbalance between the pace of growth and development and the ability of the city to provide adequate facilities and services to support it. Almost all of the 180,000 people added to the city since its inception reside north of it, much to the benefit of the city’s agricultural industry, infrastructure system, neighborhoods and overall quality of life. Now the Green Line takes its place as one of the critical elements of our redevelopment policy. The city’s redevelopment policy and the city’s rural preservation policy are not two separate policies. Rather, they are two parts of the same policy. Perhaps ironically, it is the ability to urbanize in select redevelopment areas that allows Virginia Beach to protect its rural areas, and it is the protection of our rural areas that allows us to urbanize our redevelopment areas. The policies that call for intensification in selected areas of the north will result in greater demand for infrastructure to support it, and so this is where we must focus a greater percentage of our capital improvement resources. One thing that has not changed, and is not likely to change in the future, is that the city still lacks the fiscal ability to responsibly extend growth-supporting infrastructure south of the Green Line. |
[1] Beach, 2002. pg. 13
Copyright © 2006, All Rights Reserved
Department of Conservation and Recreation
Chesapeake Bay Local Assistance Programs
101 North 14th Street, 17th Floor
Richmond, VA 23219-3665
(804) 225-3440 or
1-800-CHES-BAY (1-800-243-7229)
teresa.foggsteed@dcr.virginia.gov
Please send website comments to web@dcr.virginia.gov
Address general inquiries to pco@dcr.virginia.gov
