Commission charged with identifying key scenic spots

By Joel Davis
of The Daily Times Staff

If the Blount County Planning Commission wants to regulate ridge-top and hillside development to protect scenic sections of the county, the first step is deciding what’s worth protecting.

Planning Director John Lamb told the commissioners on Tuesday to start developing lists of scenic views they thought were significant to the community and from where they could be viewed.

“Identify the places you think are important,” he said.

Last month, Lamb was directed to evaluate information from Sevier County and places from around the country to find the best way to approach the regulation. On Tuesday, he briefed the commissioners on the recommendations of a $60,000 study commissioned recently by Sevier County.

The study recommends specifically identifying areas that the county wants to project in local regulations, Lamb said, but it also makes clear that it’s not just specific locations, such as Chilhowee Mountain, that should be identified but important views, such as from along Alcoa Highway and Six Mile Road, as well.

“Where you stand makes a difference,” he said.

A guiding principle of the Sevier County study was that hillside development should not be completely prohibited.

“In other words, don’t stop everything, but look at the quality of the growth going on,” Lamb said.

One of the most important recommendations is the principle that all development should be secondary to the surroundings.

“Developments should not be the most memorable feature of hills and ridge tops,” Lamb said.

This type of focus could carry over well into the regulation of rural development as a whole, he said.

“A rural area can allow a lot of things as long as it’s not visually dominant,” Lamb said.

The study also addresses the importance of Great Smoky Mountains National Park and its surroundings.

“They are saying it’s not only the Park that is important, but what you are looking at from the Park is important, too,” Lamb said.

The Planning Commission is continuing to discuss the specific changes it wants to make to the county’s 1999 Policies Plan and other guidance documents.
“When we do write our own (ridge-top) regulations, we need to stay away from words like ‘encourage’ and ‘recommend,’” Planning Commissioner Rick Brownlie said. “We need to write tough regulations. Everybody understands the mountains are our resources.”

“The regulations need to be black and white,” Planning Commissioner Tom Hodge said.