The meeting will feature opportunities for community feedback on potential community design and development scenarios for the Village Center, residential and commercial uses and open space
SILVER SPRING, MD – The Montgomery County Planning Department, part of The Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (M-NCPPC), will host a community meeting on Wednesday, January 29, 2020 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. for the Ashton Village Center Sector Plan at the Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Station Number 4 (17921 Brooke Road, Sandy Spring, MD). The meeting will focus on obtaining feedback from the community on staff-prepared potential development scenarios for the Village Center, including residential and commercial uses and publicly accessible open space. RSVPs are encouraged but not required.
RSVP for the January 29 community meeting.
The Ashton Village Center Sector Plan covers approximately 125 acres around the intersection of New Hampshire Avenue and Olney-Sandy Spring Road (MD 108) and has been focused on land use and zoning recommendations, the pedestrian experience, green spaces and housing.
After a two-day community design workshop held in October 2019, key ideas emerged for the Ashton Village Center Sector Plan, including the following:
- Reinforce the sense of a small town and rural village through low density, low building heights, porches and variations in architectural expressions and massing.
- Preserve street trees, rural space and buffers.
- Create a green gathering space in the village core.
- Increase setbacks and gaps between buildings as density decreases from village core to rural perimeter.
- Improve walking and bicycling conditions and safety.
- Encourage more affordable housing, inclusion of duplexes and residential uses over retail.
For all the key concepts, consult the online presentation.
About the Ashton Village Center Sector Plan
The plan will evaluate land use, zoning, transportation, environment, design and other relevant issues in Ashton, a historic crossroads community east of Olney. This sector plan follows the 2015 Sandy Spring Rural Village Plan, which evaluated similar issues in the village of Sandy Spring, just west of Ashton.
One important focus will be a review of the Sandy Spring-Ashton Rural Village Overlay Zone in light of Montgomery County’s 2014 comprehensive revision of its zoning ordinance. Zones applied through the revision have enabled finer-grained management of land uses, densities and building heights than was possible under the previous ordinance.
The existing Sandy Spring-Ashton Rural Village Overlay Zone was created to ensure a “village scale” of development in the business districts of both Sandy Spring and Ashton. It limits uses, densities and building heights. The sector plan will reevaluate the overlay zone, as well as the current underlying zones in Ashton and recommend adjustments if needed to comply with the 2014 county zoning ordinance. Learn more about the Ashton Village Center Sector Plan.
For more information, contact lead planner Jamey Pratt at tel. 301-495-4588; Jamey.Pratt@montgomeryplanning.org. or Ben Berbert at tel. 301-495-4644; Benjamin.Berbert@montgomeryplanning.org.