After massive neighborhood resistance to a proposal to build a cluster housing development near Dart Drive and Warren Road the Village of Lansing Trustees took a step backward Monday when they approved a proposal to hire the Tompkins County Planning Department to prepare a 'scope of services' document that can be used to hire a consultant to study the area and make recommendations on future land use in that part of the Village.  Mayor Donald Hartill told Better Housing of Tompkins County Executive Director John Spence that he anticipates the study will take three months.

"We'll be back in business to understand the relationship between the Lansing Reserve proposal to the constraints that are there to the likely evolution of whatever that plan suggests and move forward from there," Hartill said Monday.  "But right now we feel that the Planning Board and the Board of Trustees don't have enough information and long term vision as to how this should evolve.  Everything is on the table in some sense."
 
The Lansing Reserve project is proposed for a 23 acre lot near Warren Road, between Dart and Northwoods Drives.  It will consist of 65 town home units, each with an attached one car garage.  Better Housing of Tompkins County will be the majority owner and manager of the project.  They have partnered with NRP Group, which is raising investment funding.  A Planned Development Area (PDA) has been proposed for the project that will, if approved, allow for about half of the property to remain ever wild, while the rest is devoted to townhouse units, each with a one-car garage.  The project would blend market value rentals with affordable housing units.  Current zoning without a PDA allows 80 units on the property with no special permitting or zoning changes.

Outcry by neighbors has been fierce with major concerns about traffic in an area that is relatively closed off and has limited right of way for access roadways.  At one time Village Officials hoped to procure Northwoods Drive.  The plan was to widen the road and configure it to Village specifications, proposing it as a possible access road for Lansing Reserve.  But in a meeting this July Northwoods Apartments representatives made it clear in no uncertain terms that they have no interest in their drive becoming a village road.  They joined with neighbors in opposing the project.

The County will compile a list of issues a consultant will study, taking into consideration current Village zoning laws, and plans including the Village of Lansing Comprehensive Plan and The village of Lansing Greenway Plan.  County planners will prepare a base map of the area and prepare a 'preliminary build out' of the study area, as well as a list of issues a consultant will work on.  Those issues include access to the proposed Lansing Reserve site and other sites nearby, traffic circulation, infrastructure needs, and open public space.

The resulting document will specify the work a consultant will do, including a study of the area and recommendations that could result in new roadways, a reconfiguration of the area.  Most urgently it will give the Planning Board and Board of Trustees solid information on which to base their decision as to whether or not the Lansing Reserve PDA is approved.

"We're still here," Spence said.  "We still think there's a need for this kind of housing and we still think this is a wonderful site for this kind of development."

Hartill says the final report should be ready by the first of the year and Village Officials will then be prepared to reconsider the Lansing Reserve proposal after the first of the year.  The Village will pay the County an hourly rate not to exceed $3,000.
 
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