EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The Charlestown Township Comprehensive Plan is intended to guide decisions pertaining to land use, housing, community facilities, circulation, and utilities for the next 10 to 20 years. The Plan includes an analysis of Charlestown’s natural and cultural attributes within the context of development pressures that are rapidly and permanently changing the entire region. In the face of these pressures, Goals, Objectives, and Strategies have been written to address growth where necessary and appropriate, without undermining the delicate ecological balance and cherished community values that define Charlestown today. The Future Land Use Plan is coordinated with civic amenities and infrastructure enhancements to encourage the conservation of Charlestown’s essential character while providing for an appropriate level of development within the context of carefully managed growth.

The Comprehensive Plan Update began with an inventory and analysis of the environmental, historical, and demographic characteristics of Charlestown. Many of these characteristics have significant health, safety, and welfare implications, which merit efforts focused on conservation. Other features, such as the landscape character and historic farmhouses, invoke a collective value system to preserve those elements unique and essential to Charlestown. Without question, unmanaged growth will ruinously degrade the environment, aesthetics, and culture of the Township.

A Visioning Process was conducted to discern visual preferences of images of Charlestown and other places. This lead to the drafting of goals, objectives, and strategies to manage the continuing development of the community. The overarching themes of the Visioning discussions pertain to:

· controlling sprawling development

· conserving the environment and open space

· minimizing traffic problems

· improving regional compatibility

· enhancing civic amenities

· managing infrastructure

Objectives and strategies are proposed to address each of these areas of interest.

The Plan for Future Land Use identifies specific areas in the Township, each with recommended policies intended to promote resource conservation while directing growth to areas more suited to development.

· Two types of Conservation Areas are proposed to protect environmentally sensitive lands through development restrictions and the creation of buffer areas.

· Recreation and Open Space Areas are described to promote an integrated network of park facilities and conservation areas, with the goal to link them with a designated trail system.

· Agricultural Priority Areas are identified to encourage the preservation of the Township’s significant remaining farms.

· Special Heritage Landscape Protection Zones are areas whose outstanding visual character justifies ambitious and creative strategies to ensure conservation and severely limit development.

· Minimal Impact Conservation Development Areas occupy the sensitive areas along the Pickering Creek Valley where any development should follow strict conservation guidelines.

· Moderate Impact Conservation Development Areas have the infrastructure to support low to moderate intensity residential and institutional campus development consistent with surrounding land uses.

· Higher Intensity Development Areas in the southern part of the Township could accommodate innovative mixed-use developments with uses such as Office, Industrial, and Commercial, as well as a revitalized and expanded Residential Village, all tied to the region with mass transit nodes.

· Other Low and Moderate Intensity Development Areas address the potential for infill in currently developed areas.

The balance of the Comprehensive Plan includes recommendations on Housing, Community Facilities, Circulation, and Infrastructure to address existing needs and to accommodate the Future Land Use Plan. In addition, regional relationships with the surrounding municipalities are discussed to promote compatibility of land uses and infrastructure. The Comprehensive Plan concludes with recommended Implementation Strategies, including ordinance changes, and various projects and programs to effect the goal of promoting conservation and managing growth for the future of Charlestown Township.

The 1976 Comprehensive Plan provided a reasonable blueprint for conservation and growth over the last 25 years. It was very successful in ensuring that Charlestown maintains a vitality and beauty enjoyed by all. The Township is confident that this update will provide the needed policy framework to address the next generation of changes in Charlestown through 2020. The challenge will be to communicate the findings and recommendations of this Plan to landowners and developers so that a shared vision will occur.