SILVERTHORNE - The Lower Blue Planning Commission is embarking on two long-term tasks, both of which will lay the groundwork for future development in the Lower Blue Basin.

The first is hammering out an updated master plan, which serves as a guide for growth for unincorporated land from the Dillon Dam to the Grand County line.

The last master plan update was completed in March 2002 and outlined land use suggestions for the town of Silverthorne, agricultural areas, rural areas and national forest lands.

The county's planning department has set an aggressive December 2005 timeline to complete the update through a series of community meetings and work sessions with the planning commission.

A large part of the update will involve adopting an updated Heeney community subbasin plan, which was last updated in 1988.

Preserving the backcountry

The planning commission will also come up with a functioning TDR program.

TDRs are designed to preserve backcountry land by selling development rights and reassigning them to urban areas, thereby keeping development in one area, while leaving backcountry areas and mountain views undisturbed.

Each of the county's four basins - Upper Blue, Lower Blue, Ten Mile and Snake River - has a TDR program, although the Ten Mile and Lower Blue plans are both non-descript and haven't been used much, according to planning director Jim Curnutte.

In the past three years, the Upper Blue program has preserved 900 acres of backcountry land, while adding more density in Breckenridge, Curnutte said.

In September 2003, a group of eight citizens, including several Lower Blue Planning Commission members and Silverthorne council member Peggy Long, created a TDR committee.

After 10 meetings, they came up with various suggestions of how the TDR program should be used, including:

-- TDR sending areas should include all lands 35 acres or larger in the rural area of the basin, unless they're set aside as open space or have a conservation easement. After a TDR occurs, the sending site property owner should retain ownership of the land, but would have to adhere to a list of uses then allowed on the land, such as agricultural operations.

-- TDR receiving areas could potentially be unincorporated land in the Silverthorne area, parcels within the town of Silverthorne, other basins in the county and eligible rural area lands. Currently, no land in the Lower Blue is identified as a receiving site. Receiving sites must be land that is already properly zoned for additional structures.

-- The value of TDRs should be determined on a case-by-case basis. TDRs cost $34,000 each in the Upper Blue Basin.

Other TDR program issues to be discussed include whether to award incentives to developers who use TDRs.

The idea is to develop working TDR programs for each of the four basins, then create a countywide program that allows all four individual plans to operate together.



Nicole Formosa can be reached at (970) 668-3998, ext. 229, or at nformosa@summitdaily.com