Proposed Smyrna Development Stirs Controversy

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Developers looking to build more than a dozen new homes in Smyrna are running up against neighbors who oppose the proposal due to the high density currently called for.

A petition on change.org urges the Smyrna City Council to vote down Venture Homes’ request to rezone six acres of land behind North Cooper Lake Road from R-20 to RAD-conditional for the construction of 15 homes on the plot of land.

The petition claims that Venture’s plans have a density of roughly four homes per acre due to the topography of the parcel. The high-density development would be out of character with the surroundings, which contain “established R-20 neighborhoods: Bennett Woods, Pineview Manor, Grace Meadows, and N. Cooper Lake Road.”

“You could drop two of the proposed units into one Plumcrest Road lot with room to spare,” according to the petition. Homes could be as close as 10 feet apart from one another.

The added homes would do nothing to ease the traffic issues in that area of Smyrna, and would allegedly put unneeded strain on the taxed storm drainage at Plumcrest and Pineview roads.

“I’m signing because this high density development will ruin the look and feel of our lovely neighborhood which I have lived in for over 30 years,” wrote Allison Hooks, who is one of over 300 residents who has signed the petition.

Furthermore, the petition argues, the rezoning would fly in the face of the Comprehensive Land Use plan approved by the City of Smyrna in 2007, which earmarked the property in question as R-20 density to match the surrounding neighborhoods.

Venture Homes’ rezoning request has not made it on to the agenda of the Aug. 3 Smyrna City Council meeting, but a site plan of the proposal can be viewed below.