St. Leonard Master Plan Update

[timgrover]

St. Leonard Master Plan Update Meeting

To better inform the people of St. Leonard, the St. Leonard Vision Group (SLVG) is providing the following notice.

The St. Leonard Town Center Master Plan Update Kick-off Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 22nd at St. Leonard Elementary School, starting at 6:30 p.m.

The Calvert County Department of Planning and Zoning is coordinating the update of the Master Plan, which was orginally adopted in 1995. The Town Center Master Plan sets policies and actions that guide the physical development within the Town Center, including both private and public development. The Kick-off meeting is the first in a series of meetings for the public to provide input for the St. Leonard Master Plan update. Residents and landowners within the St. Leonard 20685 zipcode are invited to attend. Please invite your neighbors. Light refreshments will be served.

The SLVG is working hard to make St. Leonard Town Center a better place to live, work, and play! Towards those goals, the SLVG advocates the following actions in the Master Plan to create a vibrant St. Leonard Town Center.

More goods and services in Town
More visibility from Rt. 2/4 to provide market for in-town shops
Expand water service and public sewer (before all of the land is underdeveloped)
Fund a sewer feasibility study in FY2009; Public sewer by 2014 for more in-town shops: People want more than a cup of coffee
No one-story strip shopping centers
More housing density to provide housing stock and market for in-town shops
More help from the Department of Economic Development to create more daytime employment. Workers provide market for in-town shops.
Updated special studies: Market analysis, land inventory & build-out potential
Designate and create a Town Square
Expand St. Leonard Recreation Park: New basketball & tennis courts, playground, and skateboard park
Extend Leonard Avenue to connect with St. Leonard Recreation Park
Remove guard rail at the end of Leonard Avenue
Install signs to help visitors find existing parking in front of Dowell House meeting hall and St. Leonard Recreation Park
More enforcement of speed limit laws

For more information about the meeting, contact the Department of Planning and Zoning 410-535-1600 x2356 or email pz@co.cal.md.us.

Tim Grover
President, St. Leonard Vision Group

 

[purplepassion]

I heard from a reliable source that the bank is going to be closing in April because it doesn't get enough business. That is going to suck. I do all my banking there. I think that will hurt St. Leonard also.

 

[timgrover]

Lack of Area Businesses

I don't know exactly why the bank is leaving. But banks need customers too! If most everyone drives out of town to the bigger, more successful towns, in terms of economic develpment, like Prince Frederick and Lusby or outside the County to do their banking, then what's a bank to do?

This is a big problem!! It can't be solved by hoping another bank comes to town. Banks need business. So the question is how to get more people to not drive out of their town to do their banking. The answer is there must be other things in town to do during that trip to the bank.

Well in St. Leonard, there's not much you can do or get done, so you leave and go up or down Rt 2/4 like everyone else has to do to get anything done, have fun, or go to work.

How do we solve that problem?? In other words, how do we make St. Leonard Town Center a destination, meaning a place where you go for a lot of reasons? Prince Frederick has become a destination because of the many stores and restaurants, the banks, the court house, library etc.. There's a lot that people can do in Prince Frederick. What can be done to make St. Leonard a destination so our storefronts are no longer dominated by liquor stores, a tavern and a tattoo parlor?

Right now, and no ill-regard or disrespect for these businesses or their owners, this town seems to be capable of supporting only these types of businesses. And, the Town has been stuck at that crossroad for the past 20 years, and things are changing only very very slowly.

To change this and we must pick a direction of change, we need to create a Town Center that is capable of attracting other businesses.

To me, the Town needs more visibility from Rt. 2/4 so people know the town is here and adequate public sewer infrastructure to serve at least 50,000 sqft of new retail, 25,000 sqft of office space, and another 200 new homes in the town center. This would make St. Leonard a fun place to visit because there would be more people living in the town and more for people to do in the town. We would have a PNC bank then!

Let me know what you think?

Tim Grover
President, St. Leonard Vision Group

 

[glenn59]

If the object is to create a central point for local citizens, then why designate it as a town center, and then relocate the post office and schools outside of it?