Planner: Southdowns needs a neighborhood plan

FuturEBR, the East Baton Rouge Parish’s new comprehensive land use plan, provides a broad outline as to how various areas should look. But it doesn’t provide a detailed blueprint for every neighborhood. “The planning document is meant to be a guide,” says Camille Manning-Broome, director of planning with CPEX, who spoke about implementation of the FuturEBR plan at a 2012 Louisiana Smart Growth Summit seminar on Tuesday. “But it’s a guide that changes with time. Things constantly need to be evaluated and re-evaluated through public discourse.” Cities that plan successfully have a big-picture document, like FuturEBR, then drill down to the ground level, she says. Manning-Broome suggests a more detailed plan for the Southdowns area could be applied to resolve controversies over specific parcels, such as the possible rezoning of a property at the corner of Perkins Road and Stuart Avenue for a medical office. “What’s really needed for that area is a neighborhood plan,” she says. A Metro Council representative, a neighborhood group, or city-parish planners could initiate the effort. As an example, she cites a detailed plan for Old South Baton Rouge that CPEX helped create. While FuturEBR’s land-use map depicts Southdowns as low-density residential, with primarily single-family homes, the map is only one component of any planning or zoning decision, says Ryan Holcomb, planning project coordinator for the city-parish Planning Commission. Surrounding land uses, trends in the area, and proximity to a highway are among the other considerations. —David Jacobs