Morgan City planning consultants and staff presented an updated draft of the city’s general plan during a Planning Commission work session, outlining new land‑use categories for downtown and residential areas, proposed parks and trails, and conceptual designs for Caboose Park and a Fishpond Park.

The consultant, John Wertz of the city design team, said the draft adds a new future land‑use category called “residential mixed” to accommodate compact townhomes and attached housing and to clarify how medium‑density areas should transition from single‑family lots. “We’ve added a new future land use, and we’ve called it, residential mixed,” John Wertz said during the presentation.

Why it matters: the draft is intended to guide rezonings, development expectations and future ordinance updates. The commission was shown where downtown mixed‑use and river‑oriented commercial designations would extend toward the river and State Street, and staff noted the Wasatch Front Regional Council’s transportation‑land use TLC grant informed the downtown and trails work.

Key points presented
- New land‑use categories: The draft removes prior numeric density bands and instead lists building types and compatible zoning categories. Staff said medium‑density residential will emphasize single‑family on smaller lots while the new residential mixed areas would explicitly allow townhomes, accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and a type of “mansion home” (a building that appears single‑family from the street but contains multiple internal units).
- Downtown and corridors: The draft extends a downtown mixed‑use designation toward the river and identifies a river‑oriented commercial area at the State Street/river intersection. Consultants noted a State Street corridor study and a walking audit scheduled that week.
- Parks, recreation and trails: The plan retains a city goal of about 4.5 acres of parkland per 1,000 residents and lists conceptual park designs, including a roughly 3‑acre conceptual park for North Morgan with a multipurpose field and pickleball courts. Consultants said Caboose Park design work is expected this winter with construction next year.
- Implementation tools: The draft discusses overlay zones (mixed residential overlays and other tools) that would be applied when “context appropriate” rather than automatically placed on the zoning map. John Wertz described overlays as tools that would require owner application and planning‑commission and council approval.

Commission reaction and next steps
Commissioners asked detailed questions about where residential mixed zones would be placed, how ADUs and flag lots are handled, and what the overlay process would require. Teresa (Planning Commission chair) and staff agreed commissioners needed more time to study the changes.

The commission did not take formal action. Chair Teresa and staff agreed to place the draft on a future meeting agenda; the consultant suggested another planning‑commission work session next month to review remaining questions before a public hearing and recommendation to the city council.

Ending: Staff will circulate the updated draft (the version with new text shown in green) and follow up with commissioners about next‑month scheduling and outreach to the historical society on downtown design details.