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,�M COG <br />�o�- °�.��, COUNTY OF DURHAM a-7 <br />�t ° °) ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT <br />°•:' -ry�t$ Open Space and Real Estate Division <br />ncanoV <br />September 16, 2005 <br />MEMO TO: David Stancil, Orange County ERCD Director <br />FROM: Jane Kmest, Durham County Open Space and Real Estate Manager <br />SUBJECT: Master Planning for the Hollow Rock Access Area <br />This memo is in follow —up to a request made at the Durham - Chapel Hill- Orange <br />County Work Group meeting on September 14, 2005, The Work Group was considering <br />comments from the jurisdictions on the draft Interlocal Agreement for the Erwin Trace <br />acquisition initially prepared by Durham County that is under consideration by Orange <br />County, Chapel Hill and the City of Durham, The draft Interlocal formalizes the <br />financial arrangements that were agreed to in the spring between the four',jurisdictions <br />for the Erwin Trace/ Duke University acquisition and includes a proposal for a master' <br />planning process and advisory committee for planning the Hollow Rock Access Area of <br />the New Hope Plan. During the Work Group's discussion, members from the Orange <br />County Board of Commissioners requested that some additional background on the <br />rationale for the master planning effort would be helpful for their Board's consideration <br />of the draft Interlocal Agreement. <br />The New Hope Creek Plan (the Plan) was adopted by all four jurisdictions in 1991. <br />Since that time each individual.jurisdiction and the Triangle Land Conservancy (TLC) <br />have been working to implement the preservation and recreation recommendations <br />within the plan. Recommendations for the Hollow Rock area are described in both <br />components 4 and 6 of the Plan, The area includes two acres already acquired by the <br />Triangle Land Conservancy, a trail easement negotiated by TLC and now held by <br />Orange County, another 7 acres being acquired by Orange County from Duke <br />University, lands owned by Wade Penny, and portions of the Erwin Trace property. The <br />Plan proposes an access area with parking and picnicking facilities on the west side of <br />Pickett Road, as well as trails through portions of all of the properties mentioned. In the <br />late 1990's an initial plan for the access area was drawn up for TLC, encompassing the <br />properties on the west side of Pickett Road area. <br />The relatively small size of each of the properties and their relationship to each other <br />makes master planning for trails and facilities important to be planned in a coordinated <br />fashion. For, instance, parking to provide access to the Erwin Trace property on the east <br />side of Pickett Road should not be designed in isolation from the potential <br />paiking/access area planned on the west side of Pickett Road. Trails that traverse all of <br />