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3 <br /> RURAL CHARACTER STUDY "ISSUES TO BE RESOLVED" <br /> April 21, 1994 <br /> BACKGROUND <br /> On January 21, 1993, the Rural Character Study Committee completed 29 months of discussion <br /> and deliberation on "Conceptual Guidelines for Rural Orange", a set of strategies for protecting <br /> rural character in the rural portions of Orange County (outside of the Orange County-Chapel <br /> Hill-Carrboro Joint Planning Area and County Transition Areas). <br /> On January 25, 1993, the Orange County Planning Board considered the Committee's <br /> recommendations, endorsing the proposal with one substantive recommended change. The <br /> County Commissioners and Planning Board met on March 10, 1994 and agreed to hold a series <br /> of community meetings to solicit opinion from rural citizens on the issues of rural development <br /> options. <br /> The community meetings were held in January 1994 after watershed plans were finalized. 53 <br /> persons attended three community meetings held in the northern, southwest and east-central parts <br /> of the County. <br /> The following list of issues is compiled from several sources, with overlap among several. These <br /> sources are the Rural Character Study Committee discussions in December 1992/January 1993, <br /> the January 25, 1993 Planning Board recommendation, the March 10, 1993 joint worksession, <br /> and principally the January 1994 community meeting comments. Most of the issues revolve <br /> around the Committee's recommended development options, but one dates back to Committee <br /> discussion. <br /> ISSUES TO BE RESOLVED <br /> 1. 2-ACRE LOT OR 1-ACRE LOT CONVENTIONAL DEVELOPMENT <br /> The Rural Character Study's recommended development options call for a range of development <br /> options to be available for rural property owners. These options are 1) a five-acre lot <br /> conventional development option with incentives, 2) a two-acre lot conventional development <br /> option, and 3) a series of Open-Space Development (OSD) options which provides a density <br /> bonus of up to 1.3 lots per acre depending on the amount of permanent open space protected. <br /> Lots of 1/4-acre or more, averaging an overall density, could be created as part of this option. <br /> Finally, lots of record would also be permitted to subdivide up to five 1-acre lots. <br /> The current zoning in the rural areas is a mixture of two-acre minimum lot size in north central, <br /> northeast, west-central and southwestern Orange; and one-acre lots in the eastern, northwest and <br /> extreme southwestern parts of the County. With passage of the new watershed protection plans <br /> 1 <br />