Sunday, March 19, 2006
Md.: Jacksonville faces water dilemma
From the Baltimore Sun
Jacksonville faces water dilemma
Many wary of development, but gas leak has spurred concern
By Laura Barnhardt
Sun reporter
March 19, 2006
It was once considered almost sacrilegious to suggest piping city water to Jacksonville.
But that was before three tanker trucks' worth of gasoline seeped into the ground at the community's crossroads. Before cases of bottled water were stacked waist-high in pantries and basements. Before takeout coffee and shower water from the household well became causes for concern.
Now, the idea of a centralized water supply -- a community well, or the politically charged notion of municipal water -- is getting
a fresh look in Jacksonville.
In Jacksonville, as in other areas of northern Baltimore County that rely on wells for water and septic systems for waste disposal, the traditional thinking has held that public water and sewage would be closely followed by rampant development.
"What concerns me is once there's city water, we'll soon get municipal waste. Construction will take off," said J.B. Jennings, a Republican state delegate who grew up in Jacksonville. "Then, it won't be long before Jacksonville looks like Cockeysville."
The Urban-Rural Demarcation Line -- commonly referred to as the URDL (pronounced "urdle") -- marks the outer limits of territory served by water from reservoirs owned by Baltimore City. The boundary was created in 1967 and has changed little. It has been compared to the Great Wall of China and described as a third rail of county politics.
A proposal by the County Council that would have allowed officials to adjust the line in certain cases brought "everybody to their feet," said Teresa Moore, executive director of the Valleys Planning Council, an influential land preservation group whose master plan first called for the URDL.
The Baltimore County URDL may have been the first Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) in the United States. It pre-dates the Montgomery County Agricultural Preserve and the Portland, Oregon UGB by over a decade, and as the article above correctly points out, is little changed since it was establishded in 1967.
What the URDL has not prevented is plenty of "leapfrog" development in the south-central municpalities of Pennsylvania, in particular in York and Adams Counties.
Jacksonville faces water dilemma
Many wary of development, but gas leak has spurred concern
By Laura Barnhardt
Sun reporter
March 19, 2006
It was once considered almost sacrilegious to suggest piping city water to Jacksonville.
But that was before three tanker trucks' worth of gasoline seeped into the ground at the community's crossroads. Before cases of bottled water were stacked waist-high in pantries and basements. Before takeout coffee and shower water from the household well became causes for concern.
Now, the idea of a centralized water supply -- a community well, or the politically charged notion of municipal water -- is getting
a fresh look in Jacksonville.
In Jacksonville, as in other areas of northern Baltimore County that rely on wells for water and septic systems for waste disposal, the traditional thinking has held that public water and sewage would be closely followed by rampant development.
"What concerns me is once there's city water, we'll soon get municipal waste. Construction will take off," said J.B. Jennings, a Republican state delegate who grew up in Jacksonville. "Then, it won't be long before Jacksonville looks like Cockeysville."
The Urban-Rural Demarcation Line -- commonly referred to as the URDL (pronounced "urdle") -- marks the outer limits of territory served by water from reservoirs owned by Baltimore City. The boundary was created in 1967 and has changed little. It has been compared to the Great Wall of China and described as a third rail of county politics.
A proposal by the County Council that would have allowed officials to adjust the line in certain cases brought "everybody to their feet," said Teresa Moore, executive director of the Valleys Planning Council, an influential land preservation group whose master plan first called for the URDL.
The Baltimore County URDL may have been the first Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) in the United States. It pre-dates the Montgomery County Agricultural Preserve and the Portland, Oregon UGB by over a decade, and as the article above correctly points out, is little changed since it was establishded in 1967.
What the URDL has not prevented is plenty of "leapfrog" development in the south-central municpalities of Pennsylvania, in particular in York and Adams Counties.
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