NEWS AND UPDATES
Archived, January 2006
More New Planning Resources
The EPA's report on density and water quality (noted below) is only one of several new planning resources from that agency and from the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC).
- Using Smart Growth Techniques as Stormwater Best Management Practices, designed "to help communities that have adopted smart growth policies and plans recognize the water benefits of those smart growth techniques and suggest ways to integrate those policies into stormwater planning and compliance."
- Growing Toward More Efficient Water Use: Linking Development, Infrastructure, and Drinking Water Policies, focusing on the connection between growth and water quality.
- Parking Spaces/Community Places: Finding the Balance Through Smart Growth Solutions, designed to "help communities explore new, flexible parking policies that can encourage growth and balance parking needs with their other goals."
Meanwhile, the DNREC's Delaware Coastal Programs offers a guidebook on alternative open space management for communities and landowners. Community Spaces, Natural Spaces (PDF) is designed "to provide communities and landowners with a reference of practical and successful open space management techniques that emphasize natural landscapes and potential options for funding and technical assistance."
(1/26/06)
A New EPA Report Looks at Development Density and Water Resources
The Environmental Protection Agency has published a new report on the relationship between development density and efforts to protect water quality. The EPA has found, perhaps contrary to popular belief, that higher-density development -- if properly located and planned as part of a larger comprehensive planning effort -- can help protect water quality. The report, Protecting Water Resources with Higher-Density Development (PDF), documents a study in which the EPA modeled scenarios of different densities at different scales over time to study their differing impacts on water quality. The study found that for a given total development amount, higher-density patterns generated less storm water runoff per house, produced less impervious cover, and impacted a smaller portion of a watershed.
(1/20/06)
State Planning Office Publishes Delaware Municipal Maps Collection
The Office of State Planning Coordination has published Delaware Municipal Maps (PDF), a collection of maps of Delaware's 57 incorporated municipalities. The individual maps are also published as part of the municipal information pages on the State Planning web site. The maps make use of the Delaware municipal boundaries spatial data published by the office and will be updated as municipal annexations are completed.
(1/12/06)
Agenda Posted for January Meeting of Delaware Preliminary Land Use Service
An agenda (PDF) has been posted for the January 25, 2006 meeting of the Delaware Preliminary Land Use Service (PLUS). The PLUS meeting will start at 8:30 a.m. in Conference Room A, on the Third Floor of the Thomas Collins Building, on Route 13 in Dover. The meeting will allow state agency planners to review and comment on projects submitted for review in January, 2006. The PLUS process helps both developers and local government leaders make informed choices regarding growth and development in Delaware.
(1/5/06)
