PORTSMOUTH
It used to be if you lived in one of the city's five historic districts and wanted to paint your house, it might take at least a month to get approval.
Now, it could be as easy as a trip to Portsmouth's planning office.
On Jan. 1, Portsmouth released a detailed set of new guidelines for the city's five historic districts: Cradock, Olde Towne, Park View, Port Norfolk and Truxtun.
Since then, city planners have been attending civic league meetings to explain them.
"They do look a lot easier to me," said Cradock Civic League President Laura Somers.
Overhauling the process began more than two years ago. The city's guidelines dated back to the 1970s, said Peter Youngblood, chairman of Portsmouth's Historic Preservation Commission. They didn't reflect new products that are now on the market and treated all the districts the same, which created a lot of citizen heartburn, he said. "It was obvious that what we had before just wasn't working."
Councilman Ray Smith was appointed as a liaison and pulled together civic league leaders, city planners and other interested parties.
The city paid Frazier & Associates about $150,000 to revise the guidelines.
The new directives are specific to the architectural features of each neighborhood.
From walkways to windows, they detail which features are appropriate to install and which are not. For example, residents are not allowed to use vinyl or aluminum shutters on any historic buildings.
The guidelines now give city planners more latitude to approve changes administratively.
Before Jan. 1, property owners had to go before one of the city's two Commissions of Architectural Review to get approval for exterior changes.
Jen McCaffery, (757) 446-2627, jen.mccaffery@pilotonline.com
Delicious
Digg
Reddit
Facebook
Google
Yahoo
Upload Your Video
iTunes Podcast
Video Feeds
Watch The Dot
