In the middle of Seminole County, near the strip shops, parking lots, high-rise apartments, and heavy traffic, there are quiet rural areas with big oak trees, dirt roads, and homes on big lots.
But now, people who live in these rural havens are afraid that as development pressures rise, their areas could lose their rural charm to traffic, dense groups of houses, and residential multiplexes.
Seminole leaders have begun to listen to their worries.
The county just started a one-year study on how to keep these rural areas safe from new projects that put more than one house on every acre or every three acres. The study could lead to stricter rules on land growth in rural areas by next fall, as decided by county commissioners.
Rebecca Hammock, who runs Seminole’s development services, said that more and more people in these rural places are complaining that developers want to build more homes on less land.
People in the area are worried that if a developer asks the commission for a zoning change, as they can now, a 3-acre plot could be split up so that four homes could be built on each acre, for a total of twelve.
Residents want the county to make it harder for these kinds of zoning changes to happen. One way to do this would be to require four votes from the five-person county board instead of the current three.
Hammock said, “Many of them have lived there for a long time and want to keep their rural lifestyles and the sense of community.”
It is okay for them to have wells and septic tanks. They also like that you can have a horse close to your house. There is a Publix 15 minutes away, though.
The rural enclaves that county workers and consultants are looking into are:
• The area south of the Black Bear Wilderness Area, between Orange Boulevard and Michigan Avenue. Most of the homes there are on two acres or more.
Lazy Acres is near Longwood. It is east of Lake Emma Road and north of Longwood Hills Road. The average size of a home is almost 3 acres.
• Oak Hollow, which is east of Dean Road and State Road 426 and just north of the Orange County line. Each lot there is about 4 acres on average.
Scott Richards, who calls himself a “country boy” and bought his house on 2½ acres off of Michigan Avenue about 20 years ago because he liked how rural the area was, said, “We are not against growth.” There are a lot of 5-acre lots next to his neighborhood.
Richards said, “Everything we want is for growth to look like it fits in with our community by having lots of space between homes.” “The natural space, forests, and wildlife are what draw people out here.” We do not want to lose that.
In the past few years, a number of gated communities with hundreds of homes on small lots have been built close to Richards’ community. Some of these new communities are Somerset, Astor Farms, and The Retreat at Wekiva.
Even though Michigan Avenue is in a country area, the roads there often flood after heavy rain because they are close to the St. Johns River. Residents are worried that building more densely will make floods worse.
Over the next 20 years, Seminole’s population is projected to rise from 485,000 people now to almost 600,000.
As a result, county officials say it will become harder and harder to build new homes and apartments. Most of the new growth will happen in the middle of Seminole, between Interstate 4 and U.S. Highway 17-92.
Lazy Acres is another rural area close to Longwood’s busy city center. Homes there are surrounded by tall trees and have mud and gravel roads.
Tom Daly, who lives here, said, “I moved here eight years ago so that we could enjoy a quieter neighborhood.” “We like having so much land.” We are also only a few minutes away from all the services and grocery shops in the city. It is a really special spot.
People who live in Lazy Acres have “chosen to live in the middle of so much development,” according to Commissioner Amy Lockhart. She said the county should protect their area.
“Many, many years ago, I begged my husband to move there.” “He told me, ‘I do not do dirt roads,'” Lockhart said about Lazy Acres.
Seminole held community talks in all three of the rural areas in September and October to get feedback from the people who lived there.
A lot of people said they would like to see new neighborhoods with fences instead of concrete walls and signs that look like they belong in the country. They also want better protections for stormwater and wetlands, as well as lots that are at least an acre in size for new subdivisions.
Eliza Harris Juliano of the Orlando consulting company Kimley Horn, which was hired by Seminole for the project, said that more than 80% of the people who came to the meetings want the county to set up rural areas with specific rules for building.
But at a recent county meeting, officials wanted to make sure that new rules on development would not get in the way of a property owner’s rights to ask for a change in land use to allow for more dense development.
They told the office of the county attorney to find out what legal options Seminole would have.
“I think the county’s lawyers will have a lot of work to do,” said Jay Zembower, chair of the commission.
In April and May, there will be more neighborhood meetings. The plans will then be talked over by commissioners at a workshop next summer. It is possible that any new rules would be put in place next fall.
Officer Lee Constantine said, “People in all three of these areas have been asking for this for a long time.” “I believe we are heading in the right direction.”