Following public outcry, Roanoke developer pulls rezoning application

It’s looking like the Old Poage Farm property, which today sits next to U.S. 221 in Roanoke County, will remain farmland a while longer.

The land was settled in the mid-1700s when King George III deeded hundreds of acres to Col. Robert Poage, but most recently, the property was proposed as a site for a new multi-use neighborhood.

On Thursday, though, the developer withdrew a rezoning request — although as the land is zoned R-1, allowing single-family homes to be built there, it may not remain the rural expanse it is today.

“You can still do higher density there,” even without rezoning, Roanoke County Supervisor David Radford said Friday.

Developer Alexander Boone had hoped to rezone about 16 acres of the 54-acre property to build 138 townhomes and 11 single family homes as well as a restaurant and “small retail options,” according to a Roanoke County application dated Nov. 8.

Townhomes in the proposal would have been priced in the low $300,000s and the single-family homes would be priced in the low $600,000s, according to the application.

But then, a horde of Roanokers turned out Tuesday for a community meeting on the project at the South County Library. Most were opposed.

Radford, who represents the Windsor Hills area, which includes the Poage Farm, called it the largest crowd he’d seen at that type of meeting.

“I was trying to get a feel of everybody’s opinions and thoughts about it, and it was all all negative in terms of the density [and] potential traffic,” he said Friday. “There were some people there who were tied to it sentimentally, because they’ve seen the Poages’ farm for all those years. So, I was just surprised by the numbers. And to me, it seemed like it was almost 100% against.”

On Thursday, ABoone Real Estate, a Roanoke-based home builder and real estate development firm led by Alexander Boone, withdrew the rezoning request.

Boone said on Friday that the company is busy with a development in Franklin County and some other projects, and that he wanted to revise the Poage farm plan based on what he heard earlier in the week, instead of moving toward a January 2025 meeting.

“We received some constructive feedback on Tuesday night and realized that if we wanted to try to incorporate some of the things that we heard… that we only had three weeks before the planning commission meeting to do so,” he said. “We decided the responsible thing to do was to to withdraw the application [and] revise it based on some of the feedback with our engineers.”

Community concerns

Diane Shelton, a retired speech language pathologist, was happy to hear the application had been withdrawn. She lives about two miles south of the Poage farm with her husband, Mark Shelton, a retired architect.

“We pass it multiple times a day, and traffic is a big concern,” she said.

For his part, Mark Shelton dislikes the design of the proposed townhomes and felt the proposed positioning of those properties did not create a community feel.

Boone said Friday he’s heard from folks especially concerned that the home on the property, which he believes was built in the 1830s, will be destroyed. Initially, Boone had hoped to use that building for a restaurant, but when engineers looked at the house, it was too dilapidated.

Where was the public outcry over the last decade, Boone asked, as the home was visibly falling into disrepair?

“It definitely was not maintained,” he said. “But no one in the community ever said anything about it.”

In 2008, the Roanoke County Public Schools bought the property for about $2.5 million with the intent to build a school, but following the recession, the county’s population declined, according to Chuck Lionberger, a spokesperson for the school system. “The need for any new school … evaporated.”

The Poages leased the land for cattle in the years after the school system purchased it.

The school system sold the property in September to an entity that shares an address with ABoone Homes for $1.1 million.

Boone’s application for rezoning was careful to note that the developer wanted to be mindful of the land’s history. “Poage Farm Village will respect and embrace the history of the Poage Farm, the Poage family and the Poage’s Mill area of Roanoke County by preserving close to two-thirds of the property and welcoming David Poage and his son Josh Poage to continue raising cattle and a garden as part of the Poage Farm Village community,” it said.

Need for housing

Roanoke County issued a statement about the rezoning application withdrawal Friday morning: “Roanoke County staff and the board of supervisors appreciate the public interest in this matter and the citizens who attended this week’s community meeting to share their perspectives,” the statement reads. “As we consider the feedback shared by our residents, we recognize the importance of addressing housing needs as a priority for Roanoke County. With demand outpacing supply, we are committed to encouraging well-planned housing developments that serve residents at all income levels and life stages, expanding housing options for everyone who calls Roanoke County home.”

Radford agrees that Roanoke County needs more housing, but maybe not as much as this project created.

“So I think we’re still focused on single-family, but in a different density that … fits the character of the rural setting that’s along 221 in the Pogue Valley area,” he said.

Paul Mahoney, another county supervisor, said Friday that it’s unfortunate that Boone pulled the application, because he thought the project looked good and that Boone has a reputation for doing first-rate housing developments in the Roanoke Valley.

“We clearly show a need for housing, not just Roanoke County, but indeed our entire region,” he said. “So I think that’s disappointing.”