Springdale planning commission weighs limited residential parking in special flood hazard area

Springdale Planning Commission members continued a months-long discussion June 4 on draft ordinance language to allow limited residential parking in the town—s special flood hazard area, proposing design measures to reduce runoff and pollution.

Planning staff presented a draft that would remove the outright ban on parking in the special flood hazard area for residential properties while continuing to prohibit commercial parking there; the draft caps parking in the flood area at three spaces per residential property and requires low-impact design measures for any permitted spaces.

The commission discussed costs, siting and technical limits for low-impact design tools such as bioswales and permeable paving; town staff said cost varies by technique and site and that permeable paving may not be appropriate where native soils are highly clayey or water tables are high. "A lot of these techniques can be done fairly cheaply," planning staff said, but the…