Faced with a motion to deny its proposal, a developer who planned a multi-story apartment and townhouse project on 31 acres along Narcoossee Road south of Rummell Road withdrew its application to build at Thursday’s City Council meeting.
The Larson at Narcoossee development would have required a land use designation to “high density residential” and rezoning it to “Planned Unit Development” on the property, a change listed by city planners as “consistent with the city’s comprehensive growth plan.”
During the City Council meeting, Council heard from residents opposed to the development who said it wouldn’t be compatible with other surrounding land uses and would create more traffic congestion, overcrowd schools and strain public services, much like what’s happened in Lake Nona along Narcoossee Road.
“If this property could remain low-density with single-family homes, I think the community would accept it,” St. Cloud resident Betty Damke said. “But, apartments? Absolutely not.”
A representative for the applicant noted nothing like this had been built in the city since 2001, and lowered the density by slightly reducing the number of apartments and townhomes originally planned, and dropped the max height of building by about one story, since the project had its first reading. She also addressed that Turtle Creek residents who say their homes would back up to the development have a 50-foot berm between them and Narcoossee Road, and the Larson buildings would be about 200 feet from the road on the other side. The road is also slated to go from four to six lanes starting in 2030.
But the plan still faced rejection when Council Member Linette Matheny made a motion to deny the Future Land Use change, and Council Member Dave Askew seconded the motion.
“I received many emails, and not one of them was in support of the development,” Matheny said. “I feel like low density is compatible here, not high density. The density is too high, too many units. I don’t feel like we need more apartments.”
“I feel like nothing much changed from last time,” Deputy Mayor Keith Trace said. “It’s still four-story apartments. I didn’t see enough give on this last plan, it’s just numbers changing on a page.”
Before the vote could be taken, the applicant withdrew its land use and zoning change requests, to the applause of members of the audience.
