In just a few days, the public will have the chance to weigh in at the official public hearing on an update of a document intended to guide development in Albemarle County.
“The local planning commission shall prepare and recommend a comprehensive plan for the physical development of the territory within its jurisdiction and every governing body shall adopt a comprehensive plan for the territory under its jurisdiction,” reads Virginia Code requiring such a document to be updated periodically.
Albemarle County first adopted a Comprehensive Plan in 1971 that established a growth management policy intended to concentrate development in urban areas and villages. The boundaries have both shrunk and expanded as the plan was updated in 1977, 1982, 1989, 1996, and most recently in 2015.
The latest plan update got underway in November 2021 and county staff have taken the lead on a process known as AC44. For previous stories on the process, check out this section of Information Charlottesville.
Both the Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors have held work sessions on the draft which is broken into four sections. Elected officials are anticipated to take a vote on October 15 after their public hearing.
Before then on September 30, the seven members of the Planning Commission will hold theirs. Both are required by state code.
On August 26, the Planning Commission went through the plan during a three and a half work session. This is one of the last steps in AC44’s Phase 4.
“In this final phase of the project, we’ve now published a complete draft document of the Comprehensive Plan so that it can be reviewed by the public, by the Planning Commission and Board for input,” said Ben Holt in Albemarle County’s long range planning division. “And that input will be used to update and finalize the plan document to be followed by plan adoption.”
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In July, the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia released updated population projections which show Albemarle increasing from a 2020 Census count of 112,395 to a population of 152,770 in 2050. A major reason for AC44’s existence is to provide a broad overview of how that growth will be accommodated.
In contrast, the number of people who have participated in the AC44 process is much smaller. Holt said that as of August 26, there had been around 400 visits to the website for Phase 4. Of that, sixteen people filled out a survey seeking comment. Thirty people attended a public overview session on August 21.
On August 26, members of the Planning Commission had the chance to provide their input.
“We’ve been through the detail, we’ve looked at the objectives, we’ve looked at the goals,” said Fred Missel, the Scottsville District Planning Commissioner who also serves as chair. “We’ve been a part of public hearings and conversations related to this.”
Missel urged his colleagues to indicate strengths, gaps, and priorities in the draft.
The first two comments were from Planning Commissioners who felt the entire document could use help from a professional editor.
“We do that at UVA, you know, every now and then we’ll bring in someone,” said Luis Carrazana, the at-large Planning Commissioner who is also an associate architect at the University of Virginia.
“In my edits I,did flag out [sections] where I said I don’t know what this objective is saying,” said Karen Firehock, the Samuel Miller District representative on the Planning Commission. “Like what is it saying? I don’t understand it. And if I don’t understand it and I’m kind of on the inside a bit and I’m trying to imagine a member of the public trying to understand what it’s the county saying it’s doing.”
Resources:
- Part 1 – Plan Overview
- Part 2 – Growth Management Policy
- Part 3 – Plan Implementation
- Part 4 – Appendix
Part 1 – Plan Overview
The first part of the plan provides an overview of what the Comprehensive Plan is and how it fits in with other county documents. In all there are 33 pages which conclude with a set of guiding principles.
“Our intention was to provide some history and context and also some understanding for folks who are maybe used or new to the concept of a Comprehensive Plan, why we need it, what it’s intended to accomplish,” Holt said. “And then hey, here’s our plan, here’s how it’s structured, here’s how it’s applied, so hopefully it’s easier to navigate.”
Those other documents include area plans for the development areas, corridor studies such as one for Broadway Street, Housing Albemarle, the Climate Action Plan, and the recently adopted Economic Development Strategic Plan. There is also a reference to a document intended to guide relations between Albemarle and its neighbors in regional government.
“The Three-Party Agreement between the City of Charlottesville, Albemarle County, and the University of Virginia was established in 1986,” reads page 16 of Part 1. “The agreement outlines how the three entities will interact with each other on land use issues depending on which entity owns the land.”
There is also a brief history in Part 1 that spans from pre-colonization to the Fair Housing Act to ongoing battles with Charlottesville over annexation.
“Tensions over that annexation and the need to coordinate public water supply planning led to the 1982 Annexation and Revenue Sharing Agreement between Charlottesville and Albemarle County, which remains in place today,” reads page 20 of Part 1.
There’s a history of planning and zoning in Albemarle County including the downzoning of land in 1980 to protect the watershed of the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.
Toward the end of Part 1 there are a series of trends including one bullet point that sets the tone for much of what Albemarle County government does.
“Based on U.S. Census data, the County’s population increased approximately 13.6 percent from 2010 to 2020,” read page 25. “Along with this growth, there has been an increasing demand for urban services and infrastructure, including parks, broadband, school capacity, and transportation improvements.”
Guiding principles are on page 33 but several commissioners suggested it should be much higher.
“It seems like you want to at least introduce the reader on what are the principles that are guiding this document, right from the beginning,” Carrazana said.
While Part 1 contains references to racial disparities across the United States, Commissioner Lonnie Murray urged more reference to places like Proffit, Union Ridge, and Free State which were settled by formerly enslaved people after the Civil War.
“There’s still no real mention in the comprehensive plan of these areas in Albemarle County that were the first places where slaves were allowed to settle,” Murray said. “And that’s still a defining trait of the rural areas, these communities.”
Murray also said that the people in many of these areas would later be displaced which is one reason to enshrine them in the plan.
Part 2 – Growth Management Policy
The new Comprehensive Plan update does not anticipate any changes to the growth area boundaries at this time.
“AC44 is grounded in the same overarching idea as the current Comprehensive Plan — that focusing growth within the Development Areas is the best way to preserve land for watershed protection, agriculture, forestry, and the natural environment in the Rural Area,” reads the opening paragraph.
A key component of Albemarle’s Comprehensive Plan has been a lack of transitional areas between the development and rural areas in favor of a hard edge. That’s why you’ll see a new 250-unit apartment complex like the Arrowhead on Rio Roads being constructed just across where grape vines planted at Roslyn Farm.
AC44 maintains that stance and introduces the concept of the Development Areas Utilization Review process to measure the efficiency of available land.
“While boundary changes may not be needed in the near future, there may come a point in time where the current Development Areas no longer have sufficient capacity to accommodate future housing and employment needs,” reads page 7 of the growth management policy.
The plan lays out several metrics that could be used to determine when to expand as well as criteria to review before deciding on adjusting the boundaries. Supervisors reviewed the latest build-out analysis at meeting on September 3 as you can read at Charlottesville Community Engagement. The draft AC44 still points to an analysis conducted in 2022.
Citing advocacy from the Southern Environmental Law Center, Commissioner Lonnie Murray wanted all references to future expansion removed from the document.
“It really feels like a work in progress and it was never really subjected to a review by us as the Planning Commission and not the same level of review as other sections,” Murray said.
Murray also expressed a concern about language that refers to potential swaps between underperforming land in the growth area and the rural area. This topic came up at work sessions held by the Board of Supervisors at which the Village of Rivanna was discussed.
“Several of the board members were talking about that as an area not very walkable kind of out there and maybe removing some of that,” said Planning Director Michael Barnes.
Barnes said there’s been no analysis of that specific example but the idea was to provide a framework for future discussion.
Murray said he felt more discussion needed to happen before that is included.
“This seems like something that requires significant discussion,” Murray said. “This seems like something that’s at the very beginning stages.”
Part 3 – Implementation
There are nine chapters in the implementation section of the AC44 draft totaling 214 pages. These range from the Development Areas Land Use chapter to the Plan Implementation chapter.
Missel sought to focus the conversation on “activity centers” which are mentioned in two of the four objectives of the Development Areas Land Use chapter.
“The purpose of a center is to concentrate the provision of goods and services within an area proximate to nearby residents,” reads page 28 of part 3. “This contemplates a community where people can walk, bike, or take transit between a wide array of housing choices and the daily destinations where they shop, work, or recreate.”
The current Comprehensive Plan has over 50 activity centers but the AC44 draft reduces that to 22 in order to reduce the anticipated public investment.
Commissioner Karen Firehock noted that many of the existing centers do not offer a wide variety of uses.
“The old office parks, you know, like Peter Jefferson Place, where you go there and you can’t get a sandwich, you can’t get any errands done, you have to get in your car and drive,” Firehock said.
Commissioner Luis Carrazana said it is one thing to indicate on a map that the county wants mixed use.
“We talk it up and we say the right things,” Carrazana said “The question there again is are we going to see the results?”
Commissioner Corey Clayborne had a question on one of the objectives in the Development Areas Land Use chapter which reads: “Increase the number of jobs and housing units in designated Activity Centers and Employment Districts.”
One of the option calls for “a policy that encourages developers to support multimodal transportation infrastructure and program investment in exchange for a reduction in the minimum number of parking spaces needed for a development.”
Clayborne noted that transit service hasn’t notably increased since 2015.
“How do you actually drive folks in development to encourage or incentivize multimodal if the infrastructure is not really there in place to really support that?” Clayborne asked. “So it puts a heavy dependency on multimodal, which to me I take that as bus systems and transit and so forth and we just don’t have it right now. And do we see that in the next 20 years changing substantially?”
Barnes said Albemarle has joined the Charlottesville Albemarle Regional Transit Authority which has been set up to try to increase service by finding additional sources of revenue. He said there is more information in the transportation chapter.
Another item in the AC44 document is a section on the four interstate interchanges that are within Albemarle’s rural area. There is a recommendation for small area plans for two of them.
“Based on evaluation of the four rural interstate interchanges, this Plan recommends further study of the Shadwell (Exit 124), and Yancey Mills (Exit 107) interchanges to determine what land uses may be feasible and desired,” reads page 8 of Part 3.
Commissioner Murray took issue with language that said these could be considered for development for industries that are targeted by the Economic Development Strategic Plan.
“I think one of the problems that I have with this section is I think it’s vague with insufficient guardrails,” Murray said.
Commissioner Nathan Moore was absent from the meeting but he sent in comments. These are not available for review.
Part 4 – Appendix
The appendix is currently 46 pages long and will be expanded as the 2025 build-out analysis is added. There’s a review of the engagement process for AC44, a community story, community design guidelines, and links to reference documents.
Before you go: The time to write and conduct research for this article is covered by paid subscribers to Charlottesville Community Engagement. In fact, this particular installment comes from the September 23, 2025 edition of the program. To ensure this research can be sustained, please consider becoming a paid subscriber or contributing monthly through Patreon.
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