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BOOK 88 MUE .138 7 1. expansion of the node is necessary to accommodate expansion of an existing use when no other adjacent land in the. node is suitable and the land proposed for inclusion has the same owner as the expanding use; 2. a node boundary splits a parcel rendering it unsuitable for development, and the Board of County Commissioners finds that inclusion of the parcel in the node is more appropriate than exclusion of the parcel from the node. The intent of /Policy 1.23 is to establish specific criteria for node expansion. Without such criteria, decisions are often arbitrary and inconsistent. The 70% standard then is a measure of whether a node needs to be expanded. When the subject request was submitted, staff undertook an analysis to determine whether or not the request met the 708 development criterion to qualify for node expansion. Staff proceeded with this analysis by compiling a list of all parcels in the node, obtaining the acreage of each parcel from the Property Appraiser's tax maps, and aggregating these acreage amounts. Using this method, staff determined that the total acreage in the node was 180 acres. Once the total node acreage was established, staff needed to determine the percent developed 'with non-agricultural and non- residential uses. Again, the staff used the Property Appraiser's information to do this. Based upon tax and use codes, staff determined which parcels were developed with non-agricultural and non-residential uses, and then calculated the acreage of these parcels. Using this method, staff determined that the total non - agriculturally and non -residentially used, developed acreage in the node was '16.11 acres. With only 16.11 acres in the node developed with non-agricultural and non-residential uses, the node is considered to be approximately 88 developed. This percentage indicates that there is no- need to increase the amount of commercial/industrial designated lands in this portion of the county. Since 88 is much less than 708, this amendment request is inconsistent with policy 1.23. Another consideration relating to the proposed request is the amount of commercially designated land already existing within the unincorporated portion of Indian River County. Currently, the county has 5,300 acres of commercially and industrially designated land. Of that, only 2,800 acres of the commercial/ industrial land is projected to be needed for the county by the year 2010, leaving ±2,500 excess acres of commercial/industrial land. This fact indicates that no additional commercial/industrial land is needed at present. - Future Land Use Policy 1.21 The proposed land use change would also be inconsistent with Future Land Use Policy 1.21. This policy states that node boundaries are designed to eliminate strip commercial development and urban sprawl, and to provide for maximum use of transportation and public facilities. Staff feels that a change in the subject property's land use designation would contradict Future Land Use Polic121 by creating a long, narrow, unbroken strip of commercially designated land. Additionally, this land is not substantially different from other residentially zoned land along U.S. Highway #1. Granting this request would provide an impetus for other Property owners to submit comprehensive plan amendment requests for a commercial/industrial land use designation. The result would be strip commercial development all along the east side of U.S. Highway #1. This directly contradicts Future Land Use Policy 1.21. 34 M