03intheworks.pdf

Bulletin:

1985

Joint

Professional

Development

Conference

Russell

Berusch

The

1985Joint

North

Carolina/VirginiaChapter

American

Planning Association Professional

De-velopment

Conference

was

held

October

3-5atthe

Hotel

Roanoke

inRoanoke,Virginia.

The

conference

was

workshop-oriented

and

focused

on

site plan review, performancezoning, streamlining

develop-ment

review

and

developmentdisputenegotiations.

Mr. CoferofJohn I. Cofer

and

Associates

from

Richmond

began

the discussion

by

emphasizingthe importanceofa qualitysiteplanreview.

He

pointed out thattheVirginialegislationcurrentlyoffers

lit-tledirection

on

reviewingasiteplan,

and

thatasite

planthatisreviewedstrictlyatthestafflevel

would

helpminimize ambiguity

and

improverelations

bet-ween

the public agency

and

the developer.

A

site

plan review ordinance or

accompanying

guide should be adequately detailed so as to tell the designer

what

to address. In this way, points of

mutual

conflict canbe avoided. To thisend, a site

plan review ordinance should include four statements:1)thetypeofusesdesired; 2) thescope

and

purpose of the review, including specific

re-quirementsof design, landscape preservation, park-ing

and

circulation; 3) the person

who

makes

the

finaldecisions;

and

4)theproceduresforreview

and

site plan revisions.

Mr. Coferalso articulated

some

of the

problems

associated with site plan review procedures.

Although

a detailedplanisdesirable,

many

reviews

areover-concernedwithunimportantspecifics.

Hag-glingoverthe"shapeofa

manhole

cover"or the

dif-ference

between

"a Pine tree or a Magnolia," he noted, iscounterproductive, lengthydelaysbetween plan submittal

and

response or conflicts

between

requirements alsoserve to retard

and

frustrate the

development

process.

Terry Harrington,

Land

Development

Coor-dinator of Blacksburg, Virginia, brought the perspective of astaff

member

in a smallagency to theconference. Mr. Harringtonoutlined three

pro-cess principles ofsiteplanreview. First,zoningcodes

should provide standardsfor the review.

The

zon-ingadministratorshould be giventhe authority to

waive, within limits, trivial or irrelevant require-ments. Secondly, theagency

must

work

consistent-ly

and

frequentlywiththe developerthroughoutthe

process in order to achieveboth the

community's

and

the developer'sobjectives. Finally, the

develop-ment

process

must

be

made

as time

and

cost effi-cient as possible for both the developer

and

the agency's staff. To link these principles, Mr. Harr-ington suggested the use of achecklistthat should be distributed to all parties participating in the

development

process. Importance should also be

placed

on making

on-sitevisitsboth before thesite

plan review

and

during construction.

Rex

Todd, Director of

Community

Development

ofGarner,

North

Carolina

and John

Home,

Direc-torofPlanningofAlbermarle County, Virginialed thisconference's section

on

performancezoning.Mr.

Todd

proposed that individually tailored

perfor-mance

standardsof

two

types, environmental

and

industrial,

may

be

more

effective than traditional specificationstandardsinpositivelyinfluencingthe

community's

development.Industrialperformance

standards are concerned with the performance of man'suse of the land. Environmentalperformance standardsattempttopreserveormaintain a

perfor-mance

of theland alreadythere.

A

number

ofsteps

lay at the heart of adopting performance zoning techniques.

Some

of these include:

—

theidentification

and

location

on

aseriesof

map

overlays ofthose natural

and

man-made

systems

which

are present in the planning area.

—

theidentification

and

listingof the functions

be-ing

performed

by

each system.

—

a priorityrankingofsystems

which

servesto

ex-clude

from

further study thosesytems or

func-tions of systems

deemed

not important

enough

tothecommunity,sothata

community

can focus

itsplanningefforts

on

those issues identifiedas

critical, saving issues oflesser priority for later

study.

—

Systemsanalysisisthe

most

technical stepofthe process

and

consequently will require con-siderableliterature research

and

assistance

from

experts

knowledgeable

of the various systems.

The

analysis

must

bedirectedtoward answering thefollowingquestionsrelative tothe

measure-ment

of the system's performance:

what

is the system'spresentlevelofuse;

what

isthe system's ultimate carrying capacity;

and

what

is the

re-maining

capacity of the system?

—

Performance

standards should be developed to

setthegoals

and

guidelines foreach system

and

sub-system's functions.

Once

all

performance

standards are developed they should be incor-porated into

an

ordinance format.

The

jurisdic-tion

may

wish to address directly the issue of whether zonesaretobeused,

what

type of zones,

and

what

otherrequirements orrestrictions in-side eachzone, besides

performance

standards, are desirable.

—

The

application ofperformance standardsof the

industrial

and

environmental type are not

necessarilyareplacementfor existingzoning

con-trols, but

may

beadministered assupplementary regulations to the basic controls.

At

the very

least, performance standards provideaplatform

from

which

torethink

and

embellish

upon

tradi-tional zoning practices.

Mr. John

Home

talked abouttheuse of

residen-tial

performance

standards

by

individual

com-munitiestoencouragequalityhousing development.

Some

of the ideasbehind residential performance standards aretoeliminate theneedforrezoning

and

theprovision offlexibilityindevelopment

and

hous-ingdesign. Essentially, residentialperformance

stan-dards

make

sure that developments satisfy the general

performance

requirementsbefore construc-tion approval is granted. In satisfying these

re-quirements fourbasiccharacteristicsshould be en-couraged: efficientlandusepatterns; reduced hous-ing

and

publicfacilitycosts; energyefficient hous-ing

and

housingpatterns;

and

environmentally

sen-sitive land use.

Mr.

Home

also outlined the ideas behind the grantingofdensity bonuses.Ifa developer surpasses certain requirements regarding environmental, open-space, recreation

and

energy conservation

guidelines, he

may

be

awarded

a

bonus

of afifteen

percent increase in gross density. For example, a developer

may

be

awarded

a density

bonus

for erec-ting a play

ground

or a bike path.

The

final sessionof theconference

on

resolving

development

disputesthrough mediation

and

nego-tiation

was workshop

oriented

and

was

led

by David

Godschalk, a professorat the University of

North

Carolina at

Chapel

Hill,

and

by

Bruce Dotson, Assistant Director of theInstitutefor

Environmen-talNegotiation. Participants learned

how

touse the ideas discussed about

development

review as a

forum

for resolving the conflicts

between

the city

and

the developer in day-to-day interaction.

FrankM.Moorereceivedhis lawdegreefromthe Univer-sityofGeorgiain1984and

iscurrentlyworkingwiththe ConservationFoundationof

North Carolina on the Hazardous WastePublic Par-ticipation Project.

Strategies for

Low

Level

Radioactive

Waste

Management

Frank

M. Moore

Low-level radioactivewasteisproduced

by

several different categories ofgenerators

and

consistsof a

broad

range ofmaterials. Nuclear

power

plants,

in-dustry, medicalfacilities,academic

and government

research institutions all contribute to the waste stream. In

North

Carolinathereare

some

thirty

low-levelradioactivewaste

(LLRW)

generators,including the nuclear reactor facilities of Carolina

Power

&

Lightat Southport,

Duke Power

at Cornelius,

and

General Electric at Wilmington, N.C. Research

facilitiesatDuke, EastCarolina,

UNC-Chapel

Hill,

and

Wake

Forestalso produce

LLRW,

orradwaste.

Compared

toother nuclearwaste material,

LLRW

contains relativelysmall

amounts

of radioactivity, yetitconstitutesthelargestphysical

mass

ofnuclear wastegenerated.

Currently,commerical

LLRW

isshipped

from

the generating facility to

one

of the three remaining burial sites at Barnwell,

South

Carolina; Beatty,

Nevada;

and

Hanford, Washington.

Three

other

sites,

Maxey

Flats, Kentucky;

West

Valley,

New

York;

and

Sheffield, Illinois have been closed

due

to water infiltration

and

radionuclide migration.

highcoststothehoststates.

The

nuclear

power

in-dustryisthelargestproducerof radwaste,

and

op-ponents of the current waste

management

system arguethat the industryshould beheld to a higher standard of responsibility.

The

management

of low-level radwaste has always been problematic. Burial technology has beenprovenineffective incontainingradioactivity.

Traditionalsafeguardsinvolvedliningthetrench

and

covering the stacked contentswith clay, forming a

domed

top.

The

conventional

wisdom was

thatthe

clay

would

prevent water intrusion,

and

thebase

would

retard leaching sufficiently to prevent the

escape of

any

radioactive material. But leakage has occurred, withresultsparticularly

poor

inareas of highrainfall

and

delicatesoilstructures.

Even

when

lined

and

coveredwithplastic, satisfactory isolation

has not been achieved.

Federal regulations vicariously define low-level radioactivewasteas

any

radioactivewastenot

defin-ed to be high-level waste. This creates a

broad

category,

and

includes

some

very radioactive

material, bothintermsofradiationpenetration

and

half-lives.

These

materialscanbediluted to

accep-table levels

by

thegenerators priortoshipment, but overtimetheirconcentration builds

up

atthe burial

site,

making

the

amount

ofradiationfar

beyond

that

anticipatedforradioactivewastedisposal. Itis

much

more

appropriate to categorize waste according to itsphysical,chemical

and

nuclear properties sothat effectivenucleartechnology

and

management

pro-cedurescanbeapplied, includingwastesegregation,

volume

reduction,

and above-ground

storage.

A

lack of adequate disposal space for radwaste

is another

growing

problem.

The

capacity of the three operable burial facilities will

soon

be

ex-hausted. South Carolina has refusedto

expand

the capacity of its Barnwell site

and

has scheduled its

closure

by

December

1, 1992. This

becomes

par-ticularly critical as the nuclear

power

industry matures

and

olderfacilitiesreach theirusefullives

and

are decommissioned, introducing massive

amounts

of contaminated material into the waste

stream.

To address

some

of these problems, Congress passed theLow-levelRadioactive

Waste

PolicyAct

of1980.

The

legislationisbased

on

theconceptthat

eachstateshouldberesponsibleforthe

management

ofits

own

waste,

and

that

LLRW

canbe

most

safe-ly

and

efficiently

managed

on

aregionalbasis.

The

actauthorizesthe statesto

form

interstatecompacts, with each

compact

acting asa waste

management

Photocourtesy of treadsoftly quarterly. Vol. 1, No. 4

regionthatisabletoexcludeallwastenot

produced

within its boundaries

and

to determine

which

member

states willprovideneededfacilities. Instead of theremainingthreewasteburialsites, therecould beas

many

asnine,

and

no one

state

would

be

re-quired tocarry the

burden

ofhosting afacilityfor alargepart of thecountry.

The

Low-Level

Radioac-tive

Waste

PolicyActof1980

may

helptosolve the

problems

of inequities

and

future waste facility

capacity, but it failsto address the issues of effec-tive waste isolation

and

industry accountability.

Severalenvironmentalgroups, includingthe

Con-servation Councilof

North

Carolina, the Conser-vationFoundationof

North

Carolina,

and

theSierra

Club, advocate the implementation of alternative

management

strategies.It isparticularlyappropriate that this issue receives increased attention as the regional

compact commissions

begin to determine thefateof their

member

states.

The

power

to

con-sider

and implement

new

solutionstothe

problems

of

LLRW

management

iswithin the authority of the

compact

commissions. Unfortunately,

due

to the

economic

costs ofchange, industry pressuresexist

to preserve the traditional strategy of centralized

facilities

and

waste integration.

A

commercial

incinerationfacilityhas been

pro-posed for location in Bladen County,

North

Carolina. Iflicensed, it

would

be operated

by

U.S.

Ecology, Inc, a firm

whose

nuclear experience

in-cludes the unsuccessful

management

of the

dump

sitesat

Maxey

Flats

and

Sheffield,

and

the present

management

of the Hanford,

Washington

facility.

According to its license application, the facility

would

have the capacity to receive

and

process all

theprojectedwaste

volume

fortheentireSoutheast

monopoly

on

low-level waste

management

in the region.

There

are also concerns about radioactive

and

hazardousemissions

from

theincinerator'sstack that have not been fully addressed.

The

residents of surrounding counties

and

municipalities have organizedUnited

Concerned

Citizens for Ecology, Inc

and

theCoalitionAgainstRadioactive Incinera-tion to challenge the facility.

Opponents

of the incinerator have petitioned

North

Carolina's

Department

of

Human

Resources

to issue a declaratory ruling

on

the question of

whether

U.S. Ecology Inc

would

be required to

applyforapermittohandlehazardouswaste, under the authority of the Resource Conservation

and

Recovery Act

(RCRA),

as well asa license to

han-dleradioactive waste.

A

precedenthasalreadybeen established

by

the 1984 case of

LEAF

v. Hodel,

where

the U.S.

Department

of Energy

(DOE)

was

heldsubject to thepermit requirementsof

RCRA.

DOE

has since proposed regulations affecting all

DOE

facilitieshandling

mixed

wastes,

and

the

En-vironmental

Protection

Agency,

the

agency

authorizedto

implement

RCRA,

isexpectedto pro-pose its

own

rules soon.

The

question left

un-answered, however, istheapplicabilityof

RCRA

to

commercial

LLRW

facilities, such as the

proposed

Bladen

County

incinerator,

and

itappearslikelythat

North

Carolinawillplaya

major

role in

determin-ing the

outcome

of this issue.

An

appropriate

LLRW

management

strategy could be based

on two

simple concepts: pollution

Planning Curriculum:

Meeting

the

Challenge

The

Department

of City

and

Regional Planning

of the University of

North

Carolinaat

Chapel

Hill

hasrecentlyintroduced

two

new

teachinginitiatives in Real Estate

Development

and

Planning for Developing Countries.

The

following are brief

descriptions of thepurpose

and

design of the

new

curricula.

Planning

in

Developing Areas

Inthefallsemester, 1985, the

Department

ofCity

and

Regional Planning at the University of

North

Carolina at

Chapel

Hillestablished a

new

Masters

levelspecializationinPlanninginDevelopingAreas.

prevention

by

effective isolation

and

industry

ac-countability. Effective isolation can be defined as

waste containmentfor theduration ofitshazardous

life. Material with a short hazardous life can be stored in

temporary

containment facilities before being disposed of as ordinary waste.

Waste

with longerhalf-livesshouldbeisolated forperhaps hun-dreds of years in easily monitored,

above-ground

facilities.

Such

technologyisalreadyestablishedat

the

Sequoyah

facility in northeast

Alabama.

The

problem

ofwaste

volume

couldbesolvedthrough

theuse ofshredder-compactors.

The

overall

scheme

would

keepas

much

radioactivityaspossible

on

the

site of production

and

place the responsibility of

management

on

the generating facility. Effective

monitoringtechniques

would

beestablishedat the

facility,

and

an overall waste

management

plan

would

bedeveloped specificto eachfacility'sneed according to the type

and

amount

of waste produced.

Since

North

Carolina

may

behosttoa

new

LLRW

management

facility inBladen County,itshould be

seeking to bring into the region

more

effective

technologies

and

more

responsiblestrategiesfor the

management

of low-level radioactive waste.

Thisarticleis

an

extension ofa White Paper

on

Low

Level Radioactive Waste

Management

at the

Conservation Council of

North

Carolina. Copiesare

availableatcost.

The

opinionsin thearticleare sole-ly those of the author.

Dale

Whittington

John

Cook

Michael

A.

Stegman

Emil

Malizia

The new

curriculum isdesigned forboth students

from

developing countries

and North American

students interested in pursuing careers in interna-tional planning

and

policy analysis.

The

Department

ofCity

and

Regional Planning

hasalonghistory of training studentsforplanning

work

indeveloping countries, both at theMasters

and PhD.

level.

Over

fiftyalumnioftheDepartment

are currently

employed

in international positions with organizations such as the

World

Bank, the

United States

Agency

for International Develop-ment, consulting firms specializing in developing

areas,

and

foreigngovernments. Foreign graduates

ofthe

Department

haveoftenreturnedtotheir

home

cert

Ml

i n

J

Dtp

m

Mi

KOI

mo;

lar

I

are

Soil

Kpa

cyr., ofa

whi

las;

new

spec

countriesto

assume

positions ofmajorresponsibility

and prominence

in the planning field.

The

curriculumofthe

new

internationalplanning

program

includesfivecoursesdesignedtointroduce

studentstothe specialproblemsofplanninginThird

World

countries,

and

to train students in

develop-ment

planning methods. Special emphasisis

plac-ed

on

developingskillsinpopulationplanning,

pro-ject evaluation

and

public investment theory, en-vironmental

and

resource

management

in Third

World

countries,

and microcomputer

applications

in

development

planning.

Some

ofthe

most

difficultplanningproblems

fac-ing developing countries are related to improving the material living standardsof their populations. Forexample, expertiseinlanduse, housing, urban development,

and

water resources planning is

urgentlyneeded.Moreover,

many

developing

coun-tries face population

growth

rates

and

internal

movement

of population that result in hyperur-banization. Planners tackling such

problems

will

certainly benefit

from

an understanding of the

methods and

experience of theplanningprofession

indevelopedcountries.Therefore, inadditiontothe

Department'scorerequirements, studentsin the

new

masters

program

are encouraged to complete a

se-cond

area of specialization in a field such as

economic development

or infrastructure planning

inorderto

complement

theirstudiesininternational planning.

Well-trainedplannersforThird

World

countries are in

many

ways

better able to address the

par-ticularplanningproblemsof theircountries thanare expatriot planners.

An

understandingofthepeculiar dynamicsoperatingwithinthe society

and economy

of a given country,

and

of theneeds

and

constraints

which

itfaces serves as an advantage to

one

who

haslivedinthatcountry

and

sharesitsculture.

The

new

program

in international planning will place

specialemphasis

on

trainingstudentsfrom develop-ing countriestofill theurgentneedfor well-qualified

native planners.

It is also expected that

many

North American

planning students will take advantage of the uni-que opportunities at the

Department

to study the

problem

ofplanning indevelopingcountries.

New

opportunities areopening

up

forindividuals

skill-ed in

microcomputer

applications, urban financial

management,

infrastructurefinance

and

planning,

and

population planning.

The

Department's

new

program

will target such

growth

areas.

The new

program

will also serve as a focusfor

students of different disciplines

on

the

UNC-CH

campus

who

are interested in

development

issues.

A

wide

rangeofcourses

on

international topicsare currently offered

on

the

UNC-CH

campus

in

depart-ments

suchassociology,geography, anthropology,

economics, political science, the School of Public Health

and

theInstituteofLatin

American

Studies.

The

Department's

program

inPlanningin Develop-ingAreaswillserve as afocusedcentralcurriculum

for these students.

In additionto course offeringsat

UNC-CH,

the resources of theTriangle areaofferstudents in the

new

masters

program

aunique setof research

and

employment

opportunities in the field of

interna-tionalplanning.Students

from

developingcountries

inparticular

may

benefit

from

first-hand observa-tion of the Research Triangle Park,

one

of the world's

most

successfulplannedresearch

and

educa-tion complexes.

Planning

and

Real

Estate

Development

For

many

years real estatehasbeen taught as a separatedisciplineas wellasaspecializationwithin undergraduate

and

graduate

programs

inschools of business, law

and

design.

With

few notable

excep-tions, these

programs

have tended tofocus

on

the

legal, financial

and

other technical dimensions of

realestateratherthan

on

the

development

process.

Recently, theDepartmentof City

and

Regional Plan-ningattheUniversity of

North

Carolinaat

Chapel

Hill has created an area of specialization in real

estate

development

as part of its planning curriculum.

Although

it is integrated into the

Master

of

Regional Planning

and

Masters of Business

Ad-ministrationprograms, therealestate specialization at the University of

North

Carolina has its

own

identity

and

isneithersubordinatetoland use plan-ningnorconsidered to bea subarea of finance. It

is truly a joint program.

Of

the eight key courses

in thespecialization, four are taught in the

plann-ingdepartment,

two

inthebusinessschool,

and two

are cross-listed in both programs.

The

four-course required sequencein real estate

accounts for about a quarter of the student's total

two

year program. After these requirements have beenmet, students stillhave

ample

opportunityto

obtain additional preparationinfinance

and

invest-ment

analysis, site planning

and

design, land use planning, local public finance, housing, law,

Bolin Forest inChapel Hill,

NC

All studentsinthespecialization receivein-depth, graduate-level training in topics essential to

suc-cessful real estate practice. First year planning students learn the history of U.S. planning, the

form

and

growth

dynamics

of cities

and

regions,

economic

analysisconcerned with

efficiency/equi-ty tradeoffs

and

market

interventions, micro-computer-based training in information

manage-ment, multivariatestatistics, discounting

and

deci-sion analysis,

and

the

methods

of land use,

economic

development, orinfrastructureplanning.

RealEstateInvestment

and

AffordableHousing,

of-fered in the Spring semester, relies heavily

on

the case

method

and

appliesdiscounted cashflow, rate

of return analysis

and

other investment analysis techniquestopublic-privatedevelopment programs, regulatory

and

national housing policy issues.

First year business students begin their training with courses in financial, operational, marketing

and

human

resource

management,

general theory

and

techniquesinintegrative

management,

accoun-ting, quantitative methods,

and

economics.

In the Fall semester of their second year,

both

planning

and

business students take coursesinReal Property Decisions

and Housing and

Public Policy

which

provideoverviewsoftherealestatefield.Real

Property Decisions emphasizes the developer's perspective

on urban

economics,valuation

and

tax-ation.

The

secondpart of the course focuses

on

deal structuring, syndication,

and

portfolio

manage-ment.

Housing and

Public Policy emphasizes the publicinterestissues in real estatedevelopment; the structure

and dynamics

of local housing

and

real estatemarkets; local efforts to

manage

growth

and

toequitablyallocatethe publiccostsof

growth

bet-ween

current

and

future generations; and, the

mutual

benefits of public-private cooperation.

Students

round

out their Fall

programs

by

tak-ing

Development

Dispute Resolution

which

focuses

on

the use of negotiation, bargaining

and

media-tion techniques for resolvingor avoiding

develop-ment

dispute; Real Estate Lending,

which

focuses

on

secondary

mortgage

markets or marketing research; or Project

and

Site Design,

which

trains

non-designers inthefundamentalsof siteanalysis,

design

and

physical planning.

In the Spring semester, planning

and

business students take

two

capstonecourses

—

the

Develop-ment

Process

and

RealEstate,

Market and

Feasibili-ty.

The

former

dealswiththe coordination, project

timing

and

phasing,

and

risk mitigation of the

developmentprocess.

The

latterisa synthesis course

requiringfieldworkfor the application of relevant theory

and

techniquestoareal

world

project.Joint

teamsofplanning

and

business studentsconductthe full range of market, financial, public policy, legal/regulatory, design,

and

constructionstudiesto

prove the feasibility of real estate projects they believeshould be developed.

The

projectsspan the full range

from an

officepark to the rehabilitation of a historic mill for use as a retail center.

Students also have the opportunity to pursue course

work

directly relevanttotheir careerinterests.

Forexample, planning, studentscantake coursesin

public finance

and

investment, land use planning,

economic

and

community

development, historic

preservation or

urban

revitalization. Business studentscanspecialize in finance, marketingor pro-perty

management.

The

Department

ofCity

and

Regional Planning

of the University of

North

Carolinaat

Chapel

Hill strives toextend theintellectual boundaries ofthe traditional real estate curriculum

by

bringing it