Agenda - 02-26-1979 - Laserfiche WebLink

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2 groups organized with similar objectives at Cite twit. Carmel Church-Farrington Road area, Old Lystra Road, Heritage Hills, Antioch Church, and White Cross areas. These communities are located in southern and southwestern Orange County and a small portion of northern Chatham county. Within the area of our Southwest Community are three very productive dairy farms, three beef cattle farms, and the homes of approximately 100 persons who work in Chapel Hill and Carrboro in the fields of business, the law, medicine, the arts, letters, and the sciences. Many are professors at the University, and they contribute enormously to Chapel. Hill through their productivity and through their research grants which are largely expended in Chapel Hill for the support of personnel who are, employed by the research projects. A hasty and incomplete survey of research grants awarded to University professors living in our area shows that these persons are bringing to Chapel still grants amounting to more than $1,500,000 per year. One professor alone brought to the University and flown of Chapel Hill approximately $3,000,000 over a ten--year period. Thus, our contributions to Chapel Hill through these direct methods as well as indirectly through our real estate, personal. property, and intangible taxes to the county and through income taxes to the State are large and have an important impact upon the town. Our community is developing rapidly in terms of numbers of houses and citizens, but the growth has been orderly and well planned such that the overall effect is a pleasing admixture of the old agricultural way of life with the new communities of professional, and business people. The result is that we have preserved and developed an area of natural beauty and harmony that is, we believe, unequalled and unparalleled by any other area in the vL4inity of Chapel Hill. The existence of this beautiful area is of enormous benefit to Chapel Hill, from an aesthetic standpoint. There lies within the boundaries of our area several of the impor- tant feeder streams to University Lake, and we have made careful and wise effort to preserve the purity of that important and vital watershed. We come before you tonight because this beautiful area and important part of the University Lake: watershed is threatened by each and all of the presently proposed routes of the southern bypass thoroughfare around Chapel Hill to the west. This road, if constructed, would have a devastating effect upon our community and upon the University Lake water supply. Such a road would destroy scores of houses and lots- The road would greatly increase the rate of siltation of University Lake both during the constru:cion of the road and subsequently through the accelerated run-off from shoulders and drainage ditches. This road would inevitably accelerate development in our area, particularly around the interchanges with other roads, and this development would sooner or later, despite zoning ordinances of either county or town, be of a commercial type which would have a disasterous and deleterious effect upon the nature and character of our area. For example, such commercial development at the inter- changes would lead to high-density housing in the vicinity and thus to serious pollution of University Lake. Dr. Biggers, who is here tonight, can tell you about serious pollution of University Lake which already is occurring if you will grant him one or two minutes to make a report. However, the rate of pollution of the lake will be greatly accelerated by the new commercial and residential development which a major thoroughfare of this type will bring. Ile seriously question whether this road is really necessary. A limited-access thoroughfare of the type proposed obviously is designed to carry through-traffiq destined for points beyond Chapel Hill around the town rather than into or throu tt the town. The traffic to consider in this case is that from west to east and vice versa.. in 1971 the State Department of transportation conducted an External Origin