By Mark Wineka

Salisbury Post

Fisher-Harriss Development of Salisbury has plans to build 33 residential condominiums along the 11th hole at the Crescent Golf Club.

The Salisbury Planning Board approved a site plan for “The Villas at Crescent” Tuesday. The approved plans represent a revision to plans first submitted in September 1998.

The one- and two-story condo units will be located off Laurel Valley Way and Spyglass Hill Place.

The site covers just more than 8 acres. The units planned will provide up to 2,350 square feet.

The developer has proposed setbacks of 8 feet for the front, sides and rear of the properties. Construction will include 5-foot-wide sidewalks along portions of Laurel Valley Way and Spyglass Hill Place.

The city also has asked the developer to provide a striped crosswalk from the new condos to the clubhouse area across the street.

A part of the 11th hole’s cart path will have to be relocated, according to the plans.

The Planning Board also approved site plan revisions for the new Tilley Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealership nearing completion at 653 Bendix Drive.

The N.C. Department of Transportation required that a northern driveway access be changed to an exit-only drive.

The revised plan also calls for creating a new access from the southern driveway into the main parking lot. The new access requires the relocation of a landscape island and three parking spaces.

Planning Board members received their first preview Tuesday of the proposed Land Development Ordinance, which has been in the works since February 2004.

The Land Development Ordinance is, in effect, a new zoning and subdivision ordinance for Salisbury.

A Council-appointed Land Development Ordinance Committee has been working continuously since February 2004 on creating what it hopes will be a user-friendly document driven by principles laid out by the Salisbury Vision 2020 comprehensive plan.

It will replace the zoning ordinance written in 1964. That ordinance has been amended more than 400 times since its adoption, according to Joe Morris, planning and community development manager.

Morris said the Land Development Ordinance’s goals have included efforts to retain what planners liked about the existing zoning ordinance while implementing elements of the Vision 2020 plan.

It unifies the zoning and subdivision ordinances, which have been separate, and simplifies the zoning map for Salisbury, Morris said.

The new ordinance will have “a dramatic decrease” in the number of zoning categories, Morris said.

Planners held a public forum in September to give the public a chance to review the proposed new zoning map.

A public forum for reviewing the proposed ordinance is scheduled for Jan. 29.

Other target dates include a presentation of the final document to the Planning Board Feb. 13; a recommendation from Planning Board, March 7; a presentation to City Council, April 3; and adoption by council, April 17.

Planning Board member Diane Young served on the Land Development Ordinance Committee and said it was a difficult process. She encouraged staff to give Planning Board members who hadn’t served on the committee the chance to study the new ordinance section by section before the presentation of the whole document in February.

“It will take time,” Young said.

Contact Mark Wineka at 704-797-4263, or mwineka@salisburypost.com.