News

Planning board deadlocks on ‘irresponsible, offensive’ floodplain rezoning request

In photos at top, Travis Fowler advocates for a 185-unit apartment building at 715 Greenville Highway as Planning Board Chair Jim Robertson listens. Bottom images show flooding in the area on Sept. 27 and a rendering of the proposed four-story apartment building. [TOP PHOTOS: BILL MOSS/Hendersonville Lightning. BOTTOM IMAGES: CITY PLANNING DEPARTMENT (LEFT), ARCHITECT’S RENDERING]

By Bill Moss, Published: November 20, 2024

Travis Fowler tried his best to convince the Hendersonville Planning Board to endorse his proposal to build a four-story 185-unit apartment building on a nine-acre site that was under several feet of water during Hurricane Helene flooding.

“From a life safety standpoint, from an EMS standpoint, we’ll be able to service the site,” Fowler, the owner and CEO of First Victory Inc., told the advisory board last Thursday. “Sure, people may be inconvenienced for a short period of time, like Greenville Highway and Johnson’s ditch may have some water right there at the gas station. So we know we might see that again — we probably will — but the site will stay dry. The cars in the parking lot won’t have water over their windshield. That’s not going to happen. But we will have 185 additional doors there.”

While acknowledging the severe flooding from the epic storm on Sept. 27, Fowler asserted that there was a way to keep the land above the flood.

“What’s different about this site than any other site? Well, about a month ago, we had a historic flood in the area,” he said. “I’ve heard 1,500 years, I’ve heard medieval. So we went out, we evaluated that elevation, then we took a look at our site plan, and guess what’s new? Our site, because we’re raising the elevation (by 3 to 5 feet), won’t flood anymore.”

The pitch was panned by Jim Robertson, the planning board chair who opened the discussion with an emphatic condemnation of the rezoning application.

“I honestly find this irresponsible,” he said. “We have people that went to bed at night living in the floodplain, and they’re gone. I know (of) three people that passed away. The only thing they did wrong was go to bed and they lived in the floodplain. And we’re gonna put 450 people in the floodplain? It’s irresponsible and right now the timing is very offensive to me.”

Where will the water go?

All but 1,536 square feet of the nine-acre site at 715 Greenville is in the floodplain, and it backs up to a floodway — the even more flood-prone area closer to Mud Creek. That city-owned property at the rear is posted with a Flood Zone! sign warning homeless people to stay away because of the frequent high water.

While Fowler took pains to describe how hydrologic engineers had designed the buildup of the site and an underground stormwater retention system, he did not directly answer a question from planning board member Kyle Gilgis about where water would go that is displaced by an acre-and-a-half of roof and a 288-space paved parking lot.

“Walgreens built up, Publix built up, Fresh Market built up, and there’s obviously a flooding problem in that area,” she said. “Are you going to make it better, or are you going to make it worse?”

Travis responded that the stormwater system would alleviate flooding.

“This is a previously developed site,” he said. “It’s not a pristine open field, it’s not a beautiful canopy. It used to be a parking lot. The water that leaves the site now is not treated. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to catch all that water and we’re going to treat it so it’s going to clean up the water that leaves the site for sure.”

Gilgis responded: “The problem that I see is they can trap all the stormwater that they want to, and they can avoid all the stormwater that they want to but they can’t get from that unit to a hospital” when Greenville Highway is impassable.

Lynne Williams, who lives on Chadwick Avenue less than a quarter mile from the rezoning site, emphasized that point during the public hearing on the request.

“Did you see the picture? I was actually standing there,” she said of the Helene flooding. “The water went all the way from South Rock Grill to chest height at the front doors of Fresh Market. I’ve been warning the planning board and the council that Chadwick and South Main would become an island, and that’s exactly what happened. Our public safety was completely at risk. The only way to the hospital was by swift boat.”

‘Life jackets and a kayak’

The area from the Fresh Market to the corner of Chadwick Avenue and Greenville Highway has already been approved for other apartment projects in addition what’s already there, a planning staff analysis pointed out. The 68 units of the Residences at Chadwick are immediately to the south of the proposed development site, and the City Council previously has approved rezoning for the Lofts at Chadwick, which has state tax-credit financing approval for 60 affordable units for seniors, and Southgate apartments, a proposed 70-unit mid-rise development on land behind the Fresh Market.

Fowler touted the walkability of the Greenville Highway site and the value in putting residential development near the city’s core.

“If we don’t intensify density in downtown areas, in previously developed sites — especially that have good access to local trails, the Ecusta trail — if we don’t do that, then the folks that want to live in this area are going to live in an apple orchard, where we’re going to have a much lower density, where the impact on long travel into town is much, much worse than living right downtown,” he said.

“The tenants will be able to walk right down the road and hop on the Ecusta trail. They’ll be able to walk to town,” he added. “They’ll be able to go to any of the four grocery stores that are right in the area. We’re redeveloping a piece of property that was already developed.”

Despite the strong opposition expressed by Robertson and Gilgis, the rezoning request went to the City Council with no recommendation. A motion by Peter Hanley to recommend approval failed on a 3-3 vote, with Laura Flores and Tamara Peacock voting yes and Donna Waters joining Robertson and Gilgis as a third no vote.

Robertson facetiously offered an amendment to Hanley’s motion to salvage the plan.

“Would you consider adding a condition to the motion?” he asked. “Every unit should have its own kayak. And I think there should be annual training for the residents on how to use the kayak and life jackets: Life jackets and a kayak.”