|
The Town of Silt is currently in the process of rewriting the Town's Comprehensive Plan. |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Silt Citizen's Vote on the Silt Draft Land Use Plan at the 'Community Consensus' Workshop PRESS RELEASE For Immediate Release: Contact: Carrie McCool, McCool Development Solutions Planner - carrie@mccooldevelopment.comChris Snyder, McCool Development Solutions Planner/Landscape Architect - chris@mccooldevelopment.com Steve Mullen, ForSee Consulting Planner/Landscape Architect - smullen@forseeconsulting.biz Gale Carmoney, Town of Silt Community Development Director - gale@townofsilt.org The Town of Silt recently began working on an update to their comprehensive plan, a document which will guide * The Silt Small Town Survey, in which residents shared their opinions about the town's existing vision as one maintaining a "small town character."* The Silt Student Charrettes allowed the Coal Ridge High School students to share their thoughts about what Silt should be like in the next twenty years. The charrette details and students ideas are available here.
* The 'Quality of Life' Workshop consisted of a variety of planning exercises and activities aimed at gaining input about what contributes to the quality of life, opportunities and constraints facing Silt, what citizen's value most about Silt, and what they want Silt to be like 20 years in the future. The participants were engaged by utilizing keypad polling to respond to a "community survey" and shared their opinions. The results are available here.* The 'Growth Challenge' Workshop was our second community planning meeting wherein Silt residents, landowners, business owners, Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC), Planning Commission and Town Staff played the 'Growth Challenge' Game. The participants were divided into small teams to create a land use plan and lay out future development. They used chips representing various densities of housing, jobs, public facilities, etc., and were asked to 'play' 3,500 homes and jobs. They used markers to draw in trails/parks and roads, identify where neighborhood commercial centers would be located and could use one chip for a regional attraction. Through this hands-on planning exercise, participants were able to see how a variety of housing types, commercial development, location of parks/open space, and transportation and trail corridors in different areas would affect the overall community. After completing their plans, each group shared their plan with all the workshop participants and examined the impacts of their land use choices.
* The 'Community Consensus' Workshop was our third and final community workshop wherein approximately thirty of Silt's citizens joined together to review the results of the 'Growth Challenge' workshop game and to vote on a Community Consensus Map (Draft Land Use Plan) . The Community Consensus Map was drafted based on input received throughout the public engagement process. The Town of Silt and McCool Development Solutions (the Planning Team) utilized innovative keypad polling technology to indicate levels of support for the following framework that emerged as the core values of the comprehensive plan update:* Enhance Silt's image and design with entry and gateway signage* Promote Silt's historical legacy * Increase tourism via a regional attraction (i.e., ?Silt Beach' as a regional attraction) * Maintain open space & wildlife habitat/minimize impact on natural systems * Promote walkability/pedestrian-friendly connected neighborhood centers with parks and trails that extend current trails and recreation opportunities * Promote residential opportunities downtown and maintain downtown vitality * Promote infill/redevelopment which should be the first priority for future growth * Promote a range of attainable housing choices * Diversify the economy and create jobs/designating specific places as employment areas * Leverage existing public facilities and infrastructure and grow efficiently * Create an interconnected transportation network with distinctive road development and ½ mile connected road system * Promote the development of Silt as a visitor destination with a variety of activities and events
Keypad polling was also used to give the Planning Team feedback on the various groups that they thought would be appropriate partners to help the town achieve the comprehensive plan goals. Finally, citizens voted on whether the Community Consensus Map (Draft Land Use Plan) was representative of the public input received, which helped the Planning Team gauge the overall support of the Draft Land Use Plan. The Plan received overwhelming support in that 76% of the participants found the draft Plan to be representative of the public input and 85% supported the overall concepts contained with the draft Land Use Plan. The Planning Team's next steps are to finalize a future Land Use Map and create a draft comprehensive plan that reflects the input received and to ensure that the proposed future Land Use Map, community vision, framework, goals and subsequent policies and implementation strategies to achieve these goals are consistent with the citizens' intentions. Upon confirmation that the future Land Use Plan is representative of the community vision, the Planning Team will solicit input on the Plan from neighboring towns as well as Garfield County. For more information or to hear details about the progress of this project, contact Carrie McCool at carrie@mccooldevelopment.com or call 303.378.4540. |
