Master Plan Crucial for LU’s Future Growth

The News & Advance
Published: April 16, 2008

Though they’ve sometimes talked at each in years past, Lynchburg and Liberty University officials are now talking to each other as LU continues its phenomenal growth.
The benefits of developing a good working relationship are self-evident, for the city and LU need each other for continued success.
While growth at Liberty University continues at an amazing pace, it must be done in an orderly manner and must adhere to city zoning and land-use standards.
That growth — at least the growth inside the city’s boundaries — must be guided by a master plan that city officials have approved. Such a plan lays out where the university wants to grow and how it plans to get there.
The master plan becomes all the more important considering that the university wants to add 1,000 students a year for the next five years. That would bring the school’s enrollment up to about 15,000 by 2012.
To bring about that growth in new dormitories and recreational spaces, LU officials must work closely with the city to ensure that the city’s interests are balanced with the goals of the university.
That is happening for the most part, although the university ran into a slight snag the other day with the Lynchburg Planning Commission. The commission decided it needed more time to take a closer look at the revised campus layout submitted by the school.
LU Chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr. agreed to the delay, saying he had his own concerns about some conditions attached to the school’s request by city planners.
The university is seeking to amend an earlier master plan agreed to by the city to allow for the additional students and a corresponding expansion of campus facilities. University administrators have also requested rezoning 237 acres to allow for new dormitories and recreational amenities.
The rezoning along U.S. 460 beneath the LU logo would allow for new housing for 2,700 students. It would also include a number of athletic fields replacing the ones that will be lost with the pending construction of Crossroads Colonnade shopping center.
City planners gave the plan a generally favorable review, but attached about 25 conditions to it related to traffic flow and storm water management, among other things.
LU officials agreed to most of the conditions, but did object to a few. One of them dealt with a requirement that asked the school to remedy any negative impacts to streams or wetlands by commissioning improvements to other parts of the same watershed.
State and federal law requires such environmental mitigation, but says it can be performed anywhere and not necessarily in the same watershed.
The Planning Commission deferred the issue, requesting a formal tour of the development site before making a decision.
Give credit to several commissioners for saying they wanted to take a longer view of the development, including what will happen to LU beyond the 15,000-student mark.
What impact will be felt across the entire city as the school continues to grow?
It’s a good question. And this is the time to search for answers to the question — not after LU has moved ahead with plans that turn out to be unacceptable to or incompatible with the previously approved master plan.
Working together, city planners, the Planning Commission and LU administrators should be able to reach decisions that look carefully into the future in the best interests of both the city and the university.