As the fastest growing area in all of Knox County with a steady, but rising annual growth rate of 3.9%, the stress on basic fundamental infrastructure has also grown.
Hardin Valley Planning Advocates (HVPA), an organized community group that advocates for intentional growth, shared TVA’s planned route on their Facebook page after the stakeholder meeting held on Monday, May 10.
HVPA, along with county officials and departments, have been working to improve infrastructure to meet the growing needs of the Hardin Valley community. With this, comes change. Hardin Valley has experienced significant residential growth which has directly impacted the need for transportation improvements, sewage capacity improvements, new schools, power improvements, rezoning ordinance review and updates, and overall area planning updates.
Over the course of the last 7 years, HVPA, along with other community groups and community leaders, have been implemental and committed to the local government process requirements to see that the Northwest Sector Plan was updated, a new middle school was built, a new Northwest Elementary School was placed on the 5 year capital plan, the Hardin Valley Traffic Mobility Study was conducted and completed, sewage pipe expansion was completed, road and safety improvements were implemented including the interchange at HV and Pellissippi and the Cherahala extension, inclusion of Hardin Valley as a census identified unincorporated community, inclusion of Hardin Valley and Melton Hill in the Greenway Corridor Study and the Water Trail Plan, the Planned Residential zoning ordinance review, and other small infrastructure related improvements like storm water drains, sidewalk repairs, crosswalks, residential amenities, vegetated buffers, attention to wildlife and conservation during development, and so much more.
HVPA founder and director, Kim Frazier had this to say, “Our community has been addressing infrastructure needs for over 7 years now and we have accomplished some great things (see list above), but the work that has been done and the improvements that we have seen have inadvertently disrupted our community and changed the landscape of our area. It’s really a tough situation and it is our hope that county leaders use Hardin Valley as an exercise in how not to build a community and update and codify plans…then stick to them.”
Naturally, these improvements cause minor and major interruptions in a community, especially when exponential growth forces a municipality to back-fit infrastructure. This is where HVPA, and other groups like KCPA, stand firm on the message that communities would benefit greatly from codified plans and studies….and then sticking to them.