By DAVE HAMRICK
dhamrick@TheCitizenNews.com

Plans for a small shopping center with convenience store/gas station and additional retail shops at Ga. Highway 314 and Ga. Highway 138 will go to the Fayette County Commission with a positive recommendation from the county Planning Commission.

But the Planning Commission is recommending C-C (community commercial) zoning for the 2.96-acre parcel, instead of the C-H (commercial-highway) zoning requested by John Woolard, who wants to develop the project.

Woolard said a dry-cleaning pickup location and an auto parts store are among the tenants he hopes to attract to the center.

C-C zoning is more restrictive, excluding some of the heavier commercial uses that C-H zoning allows, Planning Commission members said. Woolard said the C-C zoning would be fine with him.

County zoning director Kathy Zeitler pointed out that the center will have to be designed in keeping with the county's special corridor architectural standards, which cover Hwy. 314 and Ga. Highway 54. Woolard said he will comply with those standards, which require a residential appearance, though other businesses nearby do not.

Those other businesses are on the other side of the Fayette/Clayton border.

In a tie vote, the Planning Commission recommended denial of Ronnie and Jimmy Alley's request for industrial zoning to allow a truck body repair shop on Walker Parkway off Ellis Road just north of Fayetteville.

Commissioners Jim Graw and Bill Beckwith voted against a motion to recommend approval of the rezoning, and the tie vote adds up to a denial.

The 1.32-acre property is part of a commercial development, and Graw and Beckwith said they didn't want to set a precedent. “Other uses that might be permitted up there is what I'm concerned about,” said Beckwith.

Commissioner Al Gilbert said the center has several businesses that are industrial in nature, and new technology has made auto body work a cleaner operation than it once was. “I'm not sure that what he's proposing isn't possibly an improvement,” he said.

“If it's the wrong zoning, then let's change the whole thing,” said Graw.

Commissioners said they might later consider recommending a change in zoning laws to allow truck and auto body work in commercial zones.

The Planning Commission's recommendations will go to the County Commission for its consideration July 27 at 7 p.m. at the County Administrative Complex.