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Even at roughly half the size of the original proposal, the number of recreational vehicles that a development company hopes to include in a waterfront community near Inverness is still staggering.
The image of 499 of these massive vehicles crammed onto 207 acres, with room set aside for a golf course, recreational areas, stores and other goodies, conjures more potential problems than community assets.
Consider that county rules for the property would allow for only one site-built house per 20 acres and you begin to understand how incompatible this proposal is with the county's goal of lessening developmental impacts on our fragile waterways.
The Planning Development and Review Board stuck to this worthy philosophy on Thursday by voting 5-2 against the Preservation Pointe project proposed by Century Realty Funds for the shore of Big Lake Spivey along E State Road 44.
The County Commission should follow suit when the proposal comes before them in the coming weeks.
To be sure, the developers have tried to make their dream work within the county's regulations and have taken steps to lessen the impacts.
In November, they scaled back the project from its original 810 units to the current 499. They also have offered to pay more than $2-million to provide water and sewer service to the site, including $500,000 to upgrade the Inverness sewage treatment plant.
These gestures, however, indicate just how lucrative the developers expect this project to become eventually.
Indeed, they intend to appeal to the high-end of the RV world, to the drivers of rigs that routinely fetch in the high six-figures. It is not a stretch to say that these RVs would put a number of homes in Citrus County to shame.
The question before the governmental bodies, however, is not whether these palaces on wheels are a good fit for Citrus County but rather how many should be allowed to park at one place at one time.
Neighbors have protested that so many vehicles and visitors would cause problems on land and on sea.
Even though they likely would not all be traveling at the same time, having several hundred of these behemoths in one part of the county at once would crowd the already busy SR 44 and create traffic nightmares.
Meanwhile, the boats that these visitors would be assumed to be bringing or renting would flood the lake and nearby river. After all, who would travel long distances to vacation for weeks or even months on a lake without intending to venture onto that waterway at some point?
County staffers believed the park would not cause undue environmental problems, but it is hard to imagine that so many petroleum-using homes, plus the chemicals needed to keep the golf course green all year, would not adversely impact the lake and adjoining waters.
The real red flag for the residents and the planning board members, however, is the park's proposed density.
While the developers say that the 2.42-unit-per-acre density would be less than that allowed in neighboring communities such as Hickory Hills and the Oak Pond Mobile Home Park, it still is too many units on such limited space.
It is for that reason that the developers need to have the county rezone the property, which would mean changing the county's comprehensive plan and the Land Development Code. Doing so would set a troubling precedent for the county.
County commissioners should follow the lead of the planning board and send this proposal cruising down the road.