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BOOK iii PAGE 0 (by right) use must be approved by the county if all applicable LDR requirements are met, there is no similar obligation for the county to approve a PD project application. PD project requests are either special exceptions or rezonings. In both cases, a site plan is required to accompany the request, and the' site plan is reviewed by the Technical Review Committee (TRC), the Planning and Zoning Commission (PZC) (at a public hearing) and the Board of County Commissioners (at a public hearing). This process is longer than the conventional site plan and subdivision approval process, which requires TRC and PZC (no public hearing) review only. Typically, PD plan information requirements are more involved than conventional site plan and subdivision applications. Due to the public hearing process and discretionary control of the county, the PD process is also less predictable than the conventional approval process. In summary, the PD process is longer, more costly, and less certain than the conventional approval process. Degree of Flexibility Conventional development standards for lot size, lot width, setbacks, and right-of- way width are designed to apply to tract housing type of development, where relatively uniform lots are spread evenly over an entire development site. Such standards are necessary for the thousands of existing, individually -owned conventional lots in the county. For undeveloped land, however, the PD process offers a more flexible approach that can better preserve and amenitize natural and manmade features, allow for a variety of residential and non-residential product type, and allow for innovative designs that simply cannot be anticipated by or accommodated under conventional standards. The PD process provides this kind of flexibility. Degree of Control Such flexibility as described above is tempered under the PD process via greater county and developer control. As structured, the PD process is controlled by the comprehensive plan in regard to uses and densities. While the comprehensive plan and the PD ordinance set overall PD limits, the Board of County Commissioners has almost unlimited use and design control on individual PD projects. Such control allows the county, through an involved public hearing process, to define uses on a project site more narrowly than conventional zoning standards, and to control a variety of design issues beyond conventional review standards. Such design issues may include: special setbacks and buffers, preservation of natural features, building location and mass, architectural design and colors, required provision of common amenities such as recreation and pedestrian areas and facilities, a variety of compatibility measures, and other relevant measures as determined on a site by site basis. Also, through the public hearing process, designs are refined and improved to the point where over 90% of all PD applications that are processed are ultimately approved by the Board of County Commissioners. A developer's "unified project control" is the key factor in making a PD project work better than independent lot by lot development within a conventional project. In essence, a PD project is designed as a whole, versus a conventional design that has the simple goal of producing relatively interchangeable "one size fits all" lots. In addition, all fimu+e ownerstresidents of a PD project are aware up -front of the overall, approved design and waivers. Therefore, deviations from conventional standards allowed in a PD project are known to buyers up -front, and future changes to the project -specific standards are allowed only via Board of County Commissioners approval at the end of a public hearing process. Thus, the PD process provides for 0 OCTOBER 14, 1999 -4-