GREENE COUNTY
If there was any question of Greene County’s expected growth, the Greene County Commissioners on Tuesday approved several preliminary plats among three burgeoning developments for Airabella by Red Clay Development and two requests from Oconee Land Development LLC for Reynolds.
Airabella at Lake Oconee, which broke ground for its planned use development in November, received preliminary approval for its third phase, which includes 209 units on 32.45 acres and complies with the county’s codes. Airabella, like similar popular live, work and play communities in greater Atlanta, will be the first for Greene County with restaurants, retail, single family homes, townhomes and apartments off its Linger Longer Road location. Many in its neighboring Reynolds development have expressed concern over its location, expected growth and proximity to Reynolds.
Commissioner Ernie Flice represents the district and takes his advocacy for the district seriously. He questioned the strategy of the Red Clay development group in seeking plat approval for Phase 3 when Phases 1 and 2 await final approvals.
Rick McAllister of McAllister Site Consulting LLC in Athens represents Red Clay and commented that Airabella’s Phase 3 will also set the location of several businesses they are working with to attract to the development.
“This is part of the commercial phase,” McAllister said. “These potential businesses need to produce a letter of intent. It’s important to move ahead here.”
Similar plat approvals were given to the Homestead at Reynolds, a high-end, 1,300-acre private enclave on Lake Oconee with homes approaching several million dollars.
Oconee Land Development LLC received a final plat approval for its six lots from 31.6 acres. The land development company also received approval for six additional lots from 5.3 acres in section six of Reynold’s Horseshoe Bend.
In a split vote of 3-2, a proposed recreational vehicle (RV) park on 91 acres on Randolph Church Road in rural Durham Town in the eastern part of the county was given a conditional use permit for gravel versus existing paved road ordinance. The heavily timbered land is part of 350 acres adjacent to Off Road Adventures at Durhamtown. According to Tim McCombs of Sister H&H LLC, which own the land, the RV park will be part of its campgrounds and paving the roads will create a lot of mud and dirt.
“We are in a very rural part of the county, which is rustic and heavily timbered,” said McCombs. “Our aesthetic is rural with over 150 miles of off-road trails. There is no sense taking in a lot of mud to vehicle sites when it is better served using gravel to access sites. Our adjacency to Off Road Adventures means we will see a lot of heavily accented and jacked-up trucks to the park. These always do well on gravel access.”
The approval means the county will need to amend an ordinance for roads going in to both rural and more populated county RV parks.