A mobile home park in Lexington received preliminary approval Thursday to expand 16 acres along Price Road, despite opposition from neighboring St. Martin’s Village.
The Urban County Planning Commission voted 7-1 after a more than three-hour hearing in a packed council chamber to approve the zoning change of 421 Price Road from a single-family zoning to a mobile home zoning for just over 16 acres.
The commission also voted not to allow Suburban Pointe Mobile Home Park to connect its streets to nearby St. Martin’s Village, one of Lexington’s first black suburbs. Many St. Martin’s Village neighbors asked the planning commission Thursday to eliminate all street connections between the mobile home park and their neighborhood.
The zone change now goes to the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council for final approval. A date for that vote has not yet been set.
The proposed expansion will allow Suburban Pointe to add 52 new lots. Some of those lots could have mobile homes with up to four bedrooms. If the zoning change is finally approved, Suburban Pointe will have more than 600 lots.
The plans also show sports fields and a community center.
Nick Nicholson, an attorney with Suburban Pointe, said the city’s comprehensive plan, which guides development and determines what types of development can go where, emphasizes the importance of diverse housing types and more affordable housing.
“This will bring affordable housing online right away,” Nicholson said. Other affordable housing projects can take much longer to build because they rely on federal, state and local funding, he said.
The plan also emphasizes activating underutilized land within the city’s urban service area. The property at 421 Price Road is underutilized former farmland, Nicholson argued.
City planners recommended approving the zone change.
Suburban Pointe was purchased by Flagship, of Erlanger, in 2021. Flagship has made several improvements to the property, including repaving the road and installing a community center, Nicholson said. Flagship has also held health fairs, holiday parties and back-to-school rallies since taking ownership.
Concerns about street connections
Neighbors in St. Martin’s Village voiced concerns during Thursday’s hearing about connecting the expanded mobile home park to streets in their neighborhood — Tibbs Lane, Dominican Drive and St. Martin’s Avenue. All three currently back up to the lot at 421 Price Road.
The plans show a main entrance on Price Road for the new section of the mobile home park.
“That could be 5,000-plus trips a day through St. Martin’s Village,” said Bruce Simpson, an attorney for St. Martin’s Village. “Even if it’s 1,000 or 2,000, trips into this neighborhood have a radical impact.”
Urban zoning rules require connectivity between neighborhoods. More connectivity helps reduce traffic on collector streets. It’s also a matter of public safety, city officials have long said. Police and fire vehicles must have multiple ways in and out of an area.
According to Ed Holmes, planner at EHI Consultants, social justice and equity are the most difficult part of planning.
“Connecting streets through this historic neighborhood would create more problems than it would stop,” Holmes said. “The lack of connectivity can help maintain social cohesion.”
Daniel Crum, a senior planner, said Tibbs, Dominican and St. Martin’s were always intended to be expanded. St. Martin’s was first built in 1955. A second section was built in the 1960s. The mobile home park was built around the same time.
Crum said the connections would allow many St. Martin’s Village residents to get to Price Road much faster than they can now.
The comprehensive plan also emphasizes connectivity, Nicholson said. Nicholson said the developer is fine with the commission deciding not to connect streets in Suburban Pointe to St. Martin’s. But the developer must abide by city rules and regulations, he said.
“We have no choice but to show those connections,” Nicholson said.
The committee ultimately decided to follow St. Martin’s Village’s recommendations and not connect Tibbs, St. Martin and Dominican to the mobile home park.
‘Not only survived, but thrived’
During Thursday’s meeting, more than 20 people spoke out against the zone change.
When St. Martin’s Village was founded in the mid-1950s, it was one of the few places where black people could live and get a bank loan to buy a home in Fayette County.
“St. Martin’s Village suffered under Jim Crow,” Simpson said. “This neighborhood not only survived, it thrived.”
Simpson said the comprehensive plan addresses equality and righting past racist practices, including property rights restrictions that prevented black people from owning land in much of Lexington.
Yet there is no policy to govern this, and residents fear the expansion of mobile homes will destroy the neighborhood their families worked so hard to build and keep intact.
“How about policies that protect African-American history?” Simpson said. “This neighborhood needs to be protected and preserved,” Simpson said.
Valerie Logan said her family was among the first to buy a home in St. Martin’s Village. The homeowners worked hard to make St. Martin’s Village a great place to live. Her father and others built patios, porches and made other improvements to the homes there.
“They’ve found ways to improve their neighborhood,” Logan said.
According to Logan, 80 to 90 percent of the homes are owned by the same families who bought them in the 1950s and 1960s.
“The city has done absolutely nothing to engage us,” Logan said.
Ann Greene has lived in St. Martin’s for over 60 years.
“We couldn’t buy a house anywhere else in town,” Greene said. “We’re a tight-knit community.”
Greene is concerned that there is no protection in Lexington’s black neighborhoods.
“They’ve either boxed us in or bought us out,” Greene said. “Leave us alone.”
Michelle Davis, president of the St. Martin’s Village Neighborhood Association, said she lives in the house her parents bought and has lived there for 66 years.
“St. Martin’s Village, known as the Village, has been a safe place to raise my family,” Davis said. Her neighbors helped her mother when she got sick and cared for Davis after her mother died. “My neighbors are my second family.”
