Plotting N Dale Mabry's fate

Brainstorming about the leg from Van Dyke to Pasco enters the homestretch.

By JACKIE RIPLEY, Times Staff Writer
Published November 16, 2007

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LUTZ 

Work continued this week on a plan to hone N Dale Mabry from Van Dyke Road to the Pasco County line.

Dozens met Tuesday night with a common goal: to make sure that when growth occurs along N Dale Mabry that it happens by choice and not by chance.

"They don't want to strip Dale Mabry," said Eli Avarado, a senior planner for Hillsborough County.

The working committee has been meeting for months on an "overlay district," a nearly 20-year-old document that limits growth along the highway.

Current zoning along that segment of the highway calls for homes and agriculture, with offices and apartments allowed only in the rear.

Shopping centers are allowed only in select locations.

Planners are touting a better mix of homes and retail.

And some attending the meetings have said they would like to see those kinds of changes, especially those that allow retail closer to the highway.

That line of thought, however, has been tempered by those who fear that Lutz might lose its rural character if more retail is allowed.

"I don't think there's enough consensus on the committee to move forward," said Gaye Townsend, a longtime Lutz resident and member of the working committee.

Options being explored include allowing more retail on Dale Mabry but limiting it to commercial nodes. Those proposed nodes would be at Lutz-Lake Fern Road and Dale Mabry; Lutz-Lake Fern Road and Sunlake Boulevard, and at the northeast corner of Van Dyke and Dale Mabry.

The outcome of Tuesday's open house will be the subject of one last working committee meeting, this month.

The last step in the nearly yearlong process will be to present the committee's findings to Hillsborough County commissioners in December.