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Council conditionally approves Austin Park Phase 3 master plan; 4-1 vote
Summary
The Bluffton Town Council voted 4–1 to conditionally approve the initial master plan for Austin Park Phase 3 (New Riverside Parcel 5A South), a 76-lot single-family development on about 63 acres. Conditions require paving a section of Holly Hill Lane, a vegetative buffer strategy and crosswalks at Benton Circle.
The Bluffton Town Council on Feb. 11 conditionally approved the initial master plan for Austin Park Phase 3 — 76 single-family lots on about 63 acres in the New Riverside plan unit development — by a 4–1 vote.
Kevin (staff member) and applicant representatives described the plan as part of the New Riverside PUD and said the town and the developer worked to resolve utility easements and to provide additional access and pedestrian connectivity. Kevin said, “this would fall under the ZDSO that’s been in place since 02/2004, for New Riverside Village,” and described an agreement to pave and provide an asphalt pedestrian path along a portion of Holly Hill Lane between New Riverside Road and Benton Circle.
Planning-commission recommendations that the council adopted as conditions include: constructing Holly Hill Lane from New Riverside Road to the project’s Benton Circle entrance (initially as sub-base/binder with a final top coat before final certificate of compliance); showing an 8-foot asphalt pedestrian path on the south side of Holly Hill Lane; and working with staff to save trees and add selective buffering where practical. Council members asked that staff and the applicant provide additional on-street pervious parking where feasible and to install striped crosswalks at the Benton Circle/Holly Hill Lane intersection.
Council members and applicant representatives also debated how the road’s farther extension — a right-of-way that will eventually connect to county-owned passive-park property — should be timed and buffered. Lauren Nemec, representing the applicant and Riverside LLC, said the Holly Hill right-of-way will remain privately held and that multiple parcel owners have easements allowing access; she confirmed the county had responsibility to continue gravel work beyond Benton Circle to the county parcel. “So in the sense that the town and the county both have property at the end of this road, it is open to the public. But it will be a privately held road,” Nemec said.
Council adopted a package of conditions (summarized in staff’s recommendation) including that the applicant pave the construction entrance segment of Holly Hill Lane to Benton Circle with final pavement to be placed before final certificate of compliance; provide the asphalt path; install buffering and landscape plantings to achieve an opaque boundary where homes back up to the road; work with staff to add on-street parking where appropriate (preferably pervious); and, where the road beyond Benton Circle is not yet constructed at the time of final compliance, escrow funds or a bond for landscaping so required buffering can be installed when construction proceeds. The council’s roll call produced four votes in favor, one opposed; no member names were recorded on the public roll call in the transcript.
