Third Survey In Progress: Where and How
Should Greenville Grow?

GVL2040, the comprehensive planning process that will give the City of Greenville a policy blueprint and decision-making guide for the next 20 years, is nearly two-thirds complete. To ensure that the draft plan takes shape in a way that reflects what the community is willing to support, the project team needs additional input from residents and community stakeholders to evaluate the benefits, costs and trade-offs associated with the three growth scenarios presented at the GVL2040 open house in February:

Scenario #1: “Stay the course” of recent decades through growth on vacant land, under existing zoning and building codes, and boost the pace of affordable housing development.

Scenario #2: Allow increased density in “nodes” and corridors and allow the development of existing vacant land, as in Scenario 1. The increased density nodes and corridors would accommodate a larger volume of affordable housing and make higher-quality transit service realistic.

Scenario #3: Allow increased density in nodes and corridors, as in Scenario 2, to accommodate additional affordable housing and higher-quality transit service—but also set aside a portion of existing vacant land as preserved open space.

The public is encouraged to participate in a new online survey designed to identify how Greenville residents and stakeholders want the community to grow and where they want growth to happen. The results of the survey will help the GVL2040 project team finalize a preferred model for growth. 

The deadline to participate is Friday, June 5. Take the Survey

Monthly Summary for March and April 2020

We kicked off Phase 4 at the GVL2040 steering committee’s March 10 meeting with an exercise that challenged committee members to distribute 20,000 new households — represented by wooden blocks — across a dozen nodes and corridors to indicate where and how Greenville should grow between 2020 and 2040. The activity was a follow-up to the February steering committee and public open house where participants said they preferred to direct growth into higher density locations to accelerate the development of affordable housing, preserve open space and improve mobility options.

During the March 10 exercise, the steering committee expressed an interest in having 12-15% of new housing units restricted to lower-income households and having those units integrated within higher density areas where growth would be directed. They also indicated an interest in having a substantial share of remaining vacant land — at least 33% — preserved as open space or turned into parkland, with revenues from higher density development helping to pay for the acquisition of land or development rights.

During this new phase, the project consultants are analyzing the costs and benefits of growing in the fashion preferred by the steering committee and will discuss their analysis with the steering committee during a virtual meeting on May 19. The project team will also gather public input on the locations of higher density nodes and corridors via a third online survey in May.