[jusduat]

We have a plan called 'The Overlay' to reform our little burb into cluster.

[hedgetrimmer]

Fight it with every breath you take.

This is not about providing housing for everyone, although its clear that it is an economic disaster when the government gets involved in housing.

Its about re-engineering Americans to give up their individuality and become good collectivists. Have you noticed that the clusters and "town center' developments pushed by smart growth resemble medieval European villages? That is on purpose, because if you've noticed Europe lately, it has become almost completely sovietized, or collectivized. When you force people to live in collective situations, its easier to engineer them into thinking like a collectivist and thinking that individualism and self government is bad.

This is the one-two whammy-- they are teaching our kids in school to be collectivists, then they rework our neighborhoods, towns and cities so that nothing is private, everything is public or the collective and poof! Suddenly America is just another regional consumer group buying products and living at the leisure of the globalist economy.

[Kay Ludlow]

We have a plan called 'The Overlay'

We had overlay district planning too. In our case, it was an attempt to transcend the boundaries of local government (who wouldn't support anything THAT radical) but "taking it to the people", getting a model ordinance written (which they did), then taking it to all municipalities to pass. They wrote the ordinance, but even here in planning crazy Centre Region I don't think any municipality adopted it. It was being sold as the way to prevent our community from ending up like Breezewood (at the interface between I-80 and I-79 in southern PA). As we stated repeatedly, there were already plenty of regulations in place that would eliminate that possibility - why add more? The model ordinance included things like what exterior coverings were acceptable on buildings in the overlay district (natural materials only); limitations on the quantity and reflectivity of glass; requirements on landscaping that would pretty much ensure that if you didn't know a business was there you wouldn't know it; sign restrictions so businesses couldn't put at readable signs to identify their hidden businesses, etc. I told people it was almost like they wanted to put out a "keep out, no strangers welcome" sign at every entrance to the region - LOL! It was ridiculed enough that it didn't pass though.

[hedgetrimmer]

Here is what the department of energy is planning for youd. Do you feel claustrophic yet? You should because all those open spaces are OFF LIMITS to human beings (except NOAA employees, high members of the federal goverment and employees and families of the NGOs engaged in the public/private partnerships that exist off your tax payer dollars):

Conventional Design

Conservation Approach

New Urbanist Design

http://www.csc.noaa.gov/alternatives/views_3d.html