By DON FLETCHER
News Staff Writer
Atmore City Council members will consider during their April 28 meeting an amendment to the city’s zoning map that will designate 64 parcels of property — most of them along or just off Alabama 21 — as General Business.
Such a designation will mean that a wide range of retail and wholesale entities — from bars, bowling alleys and bakeries to daycare centers, gas stations and more — can set up shop along the three-mile stretch of Highway 21 North that was annexed into the city more than two years ago.
The proposed zoning amendment includes properties located west of Alabama 21 and north of Escambia County Middle School, as well as those east of 21 and north of Sunset Drive.
According to the proposal (which is included in its entirety in this edition), 33 of the affected properties are along the state highway, while nine have Sunset Drive addresses, and two are on Robinsonville Road. There is also one each along Bell Fork Road, Henderson Lane, Martinville Road, North Main Street and Northgate Drive. Eleven have no listed address.
The proposed amendment also includes designation of the four annexed properties along U.S. 31, at Atmore’s westernmost limits, as M-2 (General Industrial), for industries that fall between light and heavy manufacturing.
City of Atmore Codes Enforcement Officer Greg Vaughn pointed out that the area will remain open to residential development, including single-family or multi-family (apartments) dwellings, if someone were to choose to build or buy an existing home in the new business-centered zone.
“You can have residential in a business district,” Vaughn said. “For example, Church Street — there’s quite a bit of residential on that street, which is also zoned for General Business.”
Jess Nicholas, executive director of the Escambia County Industrial Development Authority, said the zoning map amendment, if approved by the city council as expected, will benefit not only those seeking to set up a business here, but also anyone who might be considering a move here or anyone who chooses to continue to live on their property.
He pointed out that when the property was annexed in December 2022, many of the owners immediately put their land on the market and prepared to relocate.
“Between the four-laning of AL-21 many years before and the annexation, many of the residential owners along that corridor had already begun to put up their properties for sale,” Nicholas said. “I don’t know the exact count of residences that remain through there, but I know it’s not many. The B-2 designation is sort of a good ‘midpoint’ for that property because it keeps heavy industry contained in industrial parks, and it also probably keeps individual residential development, to include manufactured homes, out of that corridor unless they already exist.
“In general, zoning is seen as a positive thing in economic development. Regardless of what you’re trying to attract — residential, commercial or industrial — people tend to want to know who their neighbors are going to be for the long-term. If you’re moving to an area that you want to be ‘quiet residential,’ you’d rather not have someone build a business next door, especially if it’s loud or operates at all hours.
“Conversely, industries are very sensitive to community impact, and for the ones that know they are loud, or messy or whatever, they would prefer to be in a place that tolerates those things. And this does legitimately come up all the time.”
The economic development specialist added that the amendment’s main benefit to the city is that it “marks these properties as development opportunities, allows the city and the county to market them as such, and provides planning guidance for the future. It’s mostly a way to make things more defined for the future.”
City Attorney Larry Wettermark said when the annexation was passed by the council that the new urgent care facility located near Interstate 65, along with the impending construction of a new hospital and state prison (both of which are still on the drawing board), along with the business entities already operating there (currently only fast-food restaurants, motels and hotels), make the area the “economic anchor” of the city.
Once businesses begin to establish themselves in the new General Business zone, officials expect such development to provide a commercial link between downtown Atmore’s business community and the retail development area of Rivercane.
Anyone who wishes to speak either in favor of or in opposition to the proposed zoning amendment may express his or her feelings at the Monday, April 28, council meeting, which is set to begin at 4 p.m. in the council chamber of Atmore City Hall.