Tag council approval

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A myriad of restricted uses for a plot of land at the corner of Clark and Ballenger lanes in northeast Columbia were removed Thursday when the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission approved a rezoning.

The 10.8-acre lot went from planned district to mixed-use neighborhood, eliminating certain commercial development restrictions that were previously imposed on the land in historic rezonings.

“Development here would improve the area services at a transit and pedestrian scale. It would serve the adjacent residential (area) to have a walkable commercial function instead of traversing all the way down Clark Lane in either direction,” said Rusty Palmer, planner with Columbia’s Community Development Division.

Previous development limitations lifted with the rezoning include indoor recreation or entertainment sites, such as a bowling alley; armories; research and development labs; trade schools; or personal services, such as laundromats or salons. These developments do not need an additional conditional use permit, so do not need Columbia City Council approval.

Other allowed developments under the rezoning that would require a conditional use permit include car washes or auto repair shops, assembly halls, bars or nightclubs, halfway houses and mortuaries. These would need city council approval.

The owner of the land is Omkara LLC. In a filing with the Missouri Secretary of State’s Office, the company’s main purpose is real estate development.

“The goal is to consolidate and eliminate the split zoning where we have one parcel with multiple planned district regulations on it,” said Caleb Colbert, a Columbia attorney representing Omkara. “When we looked at the site, we felt M-N (mixed-use neighborhood) was the most appropriate zoning classification.”

The fact someone would willingly choose mixed-use neighborhood over a mixed commercial land use at a transportation node is appreciated, said Michael McMann, with the