Wall Street Journal talks with Mayor Ken Steele about new style of mixed residential-business developments geared to serve aging residents of surburbia

It’s one thing to make the news. It is a bit different to have your city featured in a national publication such as the Wall Street Journal. But that is what happened with Fayetteville as Mayor Ken Steele explained the potential for having future development geared toward older residents.

Steele was interviewed for a segment on “Making Suburbia More Livable” in the publication’s weekend edition.

The focus of the piece pertaining to Fayetteville revolved around meetings sponsored by the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) that began last year. The Lifelong Communities program was facilitated by Miami firm Duany Plater-Zyberk & Co. (DPZ) and centered on Fayetteville and several other metro Atlanta communities.

The centerpiece of the Fayetteville portion of the planning charette was the potential transformation of the 38.15-acre Stella’s Place residential development on Grady Avenue near Ga. Highway 54. That’s about two blocks from the courthouse square. The proposal, as noted by WSJ, included establishing more than 200 housing units on the acreage.

Speaking Monday, Steele said that while the current Medical Office (MO) zoning would probably enable more than 200 units, the idea is not one that rests with numbers.

“We’re more interested in quality of design and connectivity to downtown,” Steele said. “We think the charette was nice with great possibilities, but we need more than pretty pictures. We need a fixed plan and a commitment.”

The charette that included Fayetteville’s Stella’s Place looked at issues such as connectivity, pedestrian access and transit, healthy living, neighborhood retail and services, aspects of social interaction, dwelling types and consideration for existing residents.

A part of the conversation at council meetings during the past year also included the proposed Villages at Lafayette retail and mixed use development on the north side of Hwy. 54. The entire area is part of the city’s Main Street District.

The concept called for paths connecting Stella’s Place that would flow toward downtown, with additional access to the future retail across the highway. Yet another aspect of the need for connectivity are the old-style sidewalk projects along Lanier and Stonewall designed to provide a direct connection to the immediate downtown area.

The 38-acre Stella’s Place area along Grady Avenue is adjacent to the completed but still vacant retail development at Grady and Hwy. 54.

The council in mid-2008 approved the project that altered the R-22 Planned Unit Development (PUD) zoning and substituted the MO (Medical Office) zoning category for the 38-acre tract to accommodate residential units for older adults under special exception. Plans at the time called for construction of 86 attached homes and a seven-acre donation for use as a city park.

According to the MO zoning document, there is no prescribed limit to the number of residential units per acre that can be established as long as it is allowed by special exception.

As originally proposed in October 2006, Stella’s Place was granted a change in zoning from R-30 residential to R-22 PUD to allow construction of 68 single-family homes of approximately 1,800 square feet each.

The charette results for Fayetteville and the other participating cities can be found at www.atlantaregional.com/html/4921.aspx.