One of the more remarkable aspects of Del. Clifford L. “Clay” Athey’s proposed land use reform legislation is that it would enshrine the term “New Urbanism” in the state code. Other than to speak generally about “mixed use” and “walkability,” however, he does not try to define what it means. It’s the job of local governments, apparently, to supply the details.
Athey’s bill, which would require fast-growing counties to create “urban management areas” to accommodate growth, is generating a lot of heat, as Bob Burke reports today in “Time to Grow Up“, and it may never pass into law in its current form. But it shows how far legislators — some legislators, at least — have come in thinking about transportation and land use issues.
Athey boiled down to a sound bite that neatly encapsulates the thoughts I’d been trying to communicate in pages and pages of verbiage. Virginia will never solve its transportation problems, he told Burke, until urbanizing counties begin acting and looking more like cities. “What this bill seeks to do is say to counties, if you want to be urban, act like a city or town,” Athey says. “You can’t have the best of both worlds.”
That’s what the “new urbanism” dictum is all about: Nudging counties in the direction of more compact, mixed-use development and pedestrian-friendly streetscapes, thereby economizing on infrastructure. Counties like being more spread out. They just don’t want to pay for their choice. In the upcoming debate, counties will accuse the House of trying to “mandate” new transportation responsibilities upon them without paying for them. The flip side of that argument, of course, is that localities want to maintain the right to make any land use decision they want — and have the state pick up the tab for the transportation impact. With transportation funding reaching a crisis, Virginia just can’t afford that anymore.