Local officials, residents participate in regional town meeting Web conference
Several local officials, along with about a dozen area residents, gathered Monday evening to participate in the first-ever regional town meeting Web conference hosted by the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission (SPC.) The meeting, held at Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus, was convened to discuss and review future economic and community growth in a 10-county region, including Fayette, Greene, Westmoreland and Washington counties, and was conducted via the Internet.
According to SPC officials, the meeting was held to explore what area communities will look like in the future, how many people will live in the region and how many jobs will be available to area residents.
Officials said the meeting was just one part of a program called Project Region: The Southwestern Pennsylvania Plan, which was described as a
mechanism for connecting a desire by the SPC to be recognized as one of the best places to live to the region’s federally mandated implementation program of projects and actions.
“People say we need a regional plan for Southwestern Pennsylvania, and that’s absolutely true. When we plan as a region, we create regionally significant opportunities,” Jim Hassinger, executive director of SPC said. “SPC is very excited to be hosting this first-of-its-kind live Regional Town Meeting where participants can not only talk with their neighbors, but can also hear from people in other parts of the region. We encourage everyone to participate in developing our new regional plan by giving us their ideas and feedback on different growth and development scenarios for our region’s future.”
Project Region policy statements include a dedication to the revitalization and re-development of existing communities, a focus on business development and retention and maintenance of the existing transportation systems and infrastructure. Meeting participants had the opportunity to review three computer-generated scenarios of future growth development patterns. Maps and data for each scenario displayed different ways in which the region could accommodate changes and additions in the next 30 years.
And meeting goers could compare the scenarios with how the region is currently trending.
According to SPC estimates, the 10-county region will gain about 500,000 people in the next 30 years and will add 400,000 households over that same span with about 300,000 new jobs being created.
“If current trends continue, there will be little correlation between where people live and where the jobs are,” SPC spokesman Lou Villotti said.
SPC projections revealed the region is trending toward high development density in developed areas but a low amount of land being developed overall and an increased cost of basic infrastructure.
The first future projection, titled dispersed/fringe, had a very low development density but a high amount of developed land across the region with households not near highways or mass transit and infrastructure costs at a high level.
The second projection, compact/infill/transit oriented, showed an extremely high density of development, with a very low amount of actual land being used, households relatively close to transit and highways and infrastructure costs lower than projected trends.
The third projection, corridor/cluster, showed a fairly high density of development in developed areas, a fairly low amount of land developed overall, homes very close to highways and basic infrastructure costs in a median range.