Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, November 20, 1993                   TAG: 9311220275
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV8   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG                                 LENGTH: Medium

BOARD TO HEAR MORE ON PROPOSAL FOR TRAILER PARK

The controversial rezoning for the park will be back before the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors at 7 p.m. Monday at its meeting on the third floor of the Montgomery Courthouse in Christiansburg.

The supervisors last month shelved Frank and Joyce Howard's proposal to build a 76-lot trailer park on 18 acres at Cove Hollow Road.

Board members said they wanted to know if state highway officials would approve turn lanes and a new crossover of U.S. 460 to improve access to the site, located near the Roanoke County line.

In a letter the county received Friday, resident engineer Dan Brugh wrote that traffic engineering officials have recommended approval of the projects. The Howards, he wrote, would be responsible for the construction, including its cost.

The letter appears to clear the way for the Board of Supervisors to vote on the Howards' rezoning and special-use permit requests, which have generated opposition from nearby residents. The county Planning Commission voted 5-3 on Oct. 20 to recommend that the supervisors deny the requests.

The Board of Supervisors will consider several other matters at Monday's meeting, including:

Four public hearings for rezonings. Among them is 25.8 acres behind the Wal- Mart and Kmart shopping centers at U.S. 460 and Peppers Ferry Road in Christiansburg. William B. Matthews and Whitethorne Plantation Inc. want to rezone the land, once part of a Virginia Tech horticultural farm, from agricultural to general business use.

The land is the last large, undeveloped chunk of real estate between what has become the retail heart of the New River Valley and the path of the proposed highway linking the Blacksburg and Christiansburg bypasses of U.S. 460.

Revenue projections for the 1994-95 budget from the county staff. These numbers will be what drives the budget process as it proceeds through the winter. The Board of Supervisors generally adopts its budget for the next fiscal year by the end of March.

Adoption of the six-year plan for secondary road improvements. The public hearing on this plan, which the county uses to help the state Transportation Department prioritize improvements to Montgomery's 120 miles of rural roads, drew comments from more than 20 residents last month.

More talk about what to do next on three pending bond projects, including two approved by voters in referendums this month. The board will talk about when to go forward with general obligation bonds for the $2.9 million health and human services building and the $1.88 million Blacksburg branch library improvements.

Also, the board will consider how much financing it wants the Industrial Development Authority to pursue for the Falling Branch industrial park site outside Christiansburg. One plan would have the county borrowing $900,000 from the Farmers Home Administration; the other calls for $3.2 million in borrowing to fully develop the site beside Interstate 81.