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Residents hope to turn suburban sprawl into town
By JAMES THORNER, Times Staff Writer LAND O'LAKES -- Land O'Lakes residents played the part of Pinocchio on Thursday night, trying to change their awkward suburban creation into a real live town. Here's what they envisioned for a village center proposed for U.S. 41, Bell Lake Road and School Road: Cafes, shops, homes and public buildings along a placid lake, trimmed with porches, verandas and Cracker-style tin roofs, approached by brick sidewalks and grassy parks. Heading Thursday evening's community vision plan workshop at the Land O'Lakes Community Center was Avera Wynne, planning director for the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council. Wynne initially flashed dozens of photos, trying to glean from an audience of about 20 residents, county planners and planning council staffers which neighborhood styles, building materials and landscaping were preferred. Then came the brainstorming session, in which audience members fired off their conceptions of a village center. A rough consensus emerged: green space and parks, cafes and shops with outdoor seating, a historic museum or exhibits, a paved gathering space, consistent architecture focusing on natural materials such as wood shingles, and perhaps a library or a fire station. Bradley Arthur, who started the community redevelopment effort two years ago after a developer tried to build a lakeside supermarket near School Road, dubbed the style Florida "Crackeresque." A planning council staffer promptly jotted Arthur's term onto a flip chart for possible inclusion in a final report. Wynne said he hopes for the day when an architectural "Land O'Lakes style" creates a mental picture as clear as that created by the words "Key West style." But it won't be easy to take what has been an ill-defined suburban community and carve from it a cohesive, easily identifiable Main Street. Much of the community is already developed and thus largely out of the hands of planners, Wynne said. And a community overhaul depends upon a not-always-solid coalition of activists, county commissioners, developers and property owners. Organizers propose submitting a "Heart of Land O'Lakes" plan to the commissioners by the end of the year, targeting an area within about a 11/2-mile radius of U.S. 41 and Bell Lake Road. The goal is to incorporate their community standards into the county's comprehensive plan, the document that mandates which kind of development can go where. A second Land O'Lakes workshop is scheduled for 6 to 9 p.m. Tuesday at the community center. The topics dominating that night will be "Beautifying U.S. 41" and "Growth Management." Wynne hopes for better community representation at next week's meeting. Thursday's initial session attracted a smattering of slow-growth activists, architects and Florida old-timers pining for the more relaxed days of their youth.
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