SEQUIM — After four years in the works, the city now has a road map to guide planning through 2035.
During its regular meeting Monday, the City Council adopted the Sequim 2015 to 2035 Comprehensive Plan.
The plan provides the overall strategy for city growth and development for the next 20 years.
This includes how land can be developed and used; how people will move throughout the city; what parks, recreation and open spaces will be available; and how economic needs will be met in centers of shopping and employment.
The plan also establishes a framework for expanding economic opportunities while maintaining the city’s role as the “friendly” center of the rural Sequim-Dungeness Valley.
All council members present — Ken Hays was absent — voted in favor of the plan.
After four years, “I think we need to move on from this,” Councilman Dennis Smith said prior to the vote.
Work program follows
Adoption of the plan will be followed with a proposed work program to address changes to zoning, subdivision and development codes.
The work program has an anticipated start date of January 2016.
Work on the project was approved by the City Council in mid-2011 as part of the city’s “120” process.
During that process, city staff received input from over 700 participants in open houses, workshops, living room discussions, community club meetings and planning exercises that provided the values and directions necessary to develop the plan’s vision, goals and policies.
The City Council conducted a summary review of the proposed plan — chapter by chapter — during an Oct. 12 public hearing.
Following the hearing, staff made edits to the text at the request of council members, none of which changed proposed policies or directions of growth.
There was no public comment on the proposed plan during Monday’s hearing.
Population increase
The city estimates about 3,400 new residents will move into the city by 2035.
The new residents will require about 1,500 new homes, will add about 15,000 car trips a day on city streets and consume over a quarter-million gallons of water a day.
As such, the plan describes how the city can pursue efforts to maintain a “small-town” atmosphere even with the increase in traffic and infrastructure.
“About 70 percent of the city’s landscape” is zoned as single family residential, said Chris Hugo, city director of community development.
That includes large-lot homes, cottage housing and small-lot homes.
There also is an emphasis on placing garages and driveways to the rear of homes in new subdivisions to allow the front yards to be open and more welcoming to neighbors, he said.
Condos and apartments will be centralized to the downtown area and to the northwest of Fifth Avenue.
Avoids subdivisions
The plan also has been crafted to avoid isolated subdivisions that include loops and cul-de-sacs, opting instead for a more traditional street grid.
This will allow better connectivity for pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists, Hugo said.
The plan also focuses on zoning to attract desirable high-tech industry to the city’s west side and includes potential locations for new parks and schools as the population increases.
The document satisfies state statutes requiring the city prepare an update to the 2006 Comprehensive Plan no later than Dec. 31, 2016.
The plan can be reviewed online at http://tinyurl.com/PDN-SequimPlan or in hard-copy version at the Sequim Civic Center, 152 W. Cedar St.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Chris McDaniel can be reached at 360-681-2390, ext. 5052, or cmcdaniel@peninsuladailynews.com.
