Canton Township planning staff outlines master plan updates, narrows node map and proposes regional transit assessment

Erin, a township planning staff member, told the Canton Township Board of Trustees on April 8 that the draft master plan has been revised after a 63-day public comment period and that the Planning Commission recommended narrowing how the plan treats “nodes” and adding a regional public-transit assessment.

The Planning Commission opened the plan for public comment Jan. 15–March 19 and, Erin said, received “over 50 comments” and about 1,700 downloads by more than 700 users. The commission reviewed comments on March 24 and recommended several edits, Erin said: keep existing recommendations for residential areas, Cherry Hill Village, the environment and commercial uses; condense parcel and intersection nodes into a single neighborhood-node classification; provide example node projects and conduct a preliminary site analysis for each of 20 identified nodes; and add clarity on public-transit connections.

Why it matters: the planning staff framed the changes as clarifying how and where mixed-use development might be encouraged while preserving existing zoning and environmental…