Timberville tweaks land development regulations, permit requirements

TIMBERVILLE, Va. (WHSV) – The Timberville Town Council voted to approve a number of Land Development Regulation amendments at its Thursday meeting. The town’s LDRs are updated every few years as needed.

“As the town continues to grow and develop, there are lots of things that we encounter that haven’t been addressed before, might need to be addressed or might need to be changed to make sure we’re going in the right direction for a multitude of reasons: safety, aesthetics, just different things of that nature,” said Timberville Town Manager Austin Garber. “We might be able to tweak things to better regulate, to help with the appearance of the town, the overall goal is to improve the quality of life in Timberville.”

One change the town made Thursday night was to require a conditional use permit for parking lots and parking garages that are proposed in Timberville. Conditional use permits require a public hearing before they can be approved.

“It gives more input to the council, not just from someone who may be looking for that use, but for residents who may be affected by the use,” Garber said. “It’s a better process overall to get a more well-rounded input.”

The town council also passed an amendment banning the use of large shipping containers as storage buildings on residential properties.

“We were trying to be proactive on that item. “I’ve heard from several of our localities in our fairly immediate area who are starting to get an influx of requests to bring in these shipping containers to be used as storage buildings,” Garber said. “That kind of falls into the aesthetics part of the development. We want to make sure that we are going toward our goals laid out in the comprehensive plan of beautifying the town and giving a certain appearance.”

Another amendment was to take the designation for private streets out of the LDR.

“It puts all of the roadways on an even basis. If we have new developments come in, we want everything to have streets designed to VDOT standards that can be taken into the VDOT system of roadways,” Garber said. “If we have streets that are private that would never be taken into the VDOT roadway and that the town would never have any maintenance responsibility on, it’s left up to a homeowners association. Homeowners associations have a varying range of responsibilities that they can impart on their covenants that are in their developments. By taking the private designation out of the streets, everything is treated the same as a VDOT street.”

Garber said Timberville is trying not to go overboard on the regulation of development while protecting the integrity of the town and its residents and businesses.

“The biggest thing to remember is that everything we’re doing, we’re striving to improve the quality of life in Timberville,” Garber said. “Our efforts are always toward improving Timberville for the entire population.”