A Take 5 oil change could be headed for Osprey. Why residents are so angry about it.
The Willowbend development is tucked in the section of Tamiami Trail where bigger commercial activity starts to taper off. The Osprey neighborhood is surrounded by smaller restaurants and shops, with a Walmart about a mile north and a strip of businesses with a Publix across the street.
The subdivision is mostly quiet, with nature in backyards and on doorsteps thanks to the adjacent Oscar Scherer State Park. Residents bought into the tranquility thinking it a reprieve from Sarasota County’s standard traffic and bustle — a best-of-both-worlds development close enough to commercial centers to access them but removed enough to escape them.
Nick Clark moved to the neighborhood when it was first built in 2004. For 20 years, he and his family have enjoyed the steady quiet.
“That’s why my wife picked that plot,” Clark said. “Every day you look out, there’s gators or bobcats.”
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A new business just outside the neighborhood entrance, Clark and his neighbors worry, may change that.
A group of residents, organized as the Preserve Osprey advocacy group, is rallying against a potential Take 5 oil change headed for the corner of Tamiami Trail and Habitat Boulevard in Osprey. Cougar Investment Management LLC and 8Square LLC applied to build a 3,600-square-foot office building and a 1,430-square-foot service center on a 1.4-acre plot adjacent to the Willowbend neighborhood.
The developers planned to request a rezone of the parcel, which is located in the Blackburn Point Critical Area, from Commercial Shopping Center to Commercial General at the May 2 Sarasota County Planning Board meeting. The change will allow for a higher-intensity development than current zoning permits, which residents fear will take away key protective measures and open the door for continued commercial development down the line.
The application maintains that Take 5 will meet or advance county goals for commercial activity, traffic flow, safety and other critical areas. Cougar Investment Management and 8Square cited a 1992 rezone of the Blackburn Point Critical Area that primed the acreage for commercial as well as office and commercial general zonings for adjacent properties as evidence of compatibility.
“The Subject Property is located just off a major arterial roadway in an urbanized and commercially intensive area,” the Take 5 application material reads. “(It) is an ideal location for commercial redevelopment based on the surrounding land use pattern.”
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The parcel lies just off Habitat Boulevard, a winding road that leads to the Willowbend entrance. Though the site plan maintains that the entrances won’t pose a safety issue and are in compliance with county traffic standards, opponents are concerned with the blind turn that Take 5’s access point on the road will create, fearing an uptick in traffic accidents from the impeded visibility.
The application’s nature survey also maintains that the development won’t adversely affect species like gopher tortoises, scrub-jays or sandhill cranes — all of are known to inhabit the surrounding area but, according to the report, were scare on the site or not spotted at all. Still, residents are concerned for what possible chemical runoff or other pollution from the development mean for nearby nature, especially the adjacent Oscar Scherer.
With long-standing commercial shopping center designation, residents knew development would claim the parcel someday. But current zoning allows only for lower intensity enterprises like medical offices, and members of Preserve Osprey like Bob Sosinski believe the change to general will permit activity that’s too high for the area.
“It’s all light offices and medical offices,” Sosinski said. “There’s nothing in here that smacks of an oil change or a heavy-duty commercial use.”
Stipulations in Willowbend’s Declaration of Protective Covenants place restrictions on residents for lights, noise, exterior house décor and other categories to minimize impacts to the state park — which lies a quarter mile away from the edge of the neighborhood. Opponents of the Take 5 are concerned that, without the same restrictions, the business may flood the surrounding nature with excess lights, noise and chemicals.
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Petitions against the development have garnered almost 700 signatures, according to application material. Nearby residents have also sent emails in bulk to county commissioners and planning staff urging the rejection of the rezone on the grounds of the traffic and nature concerns.
Per county criteria, developments should serve the community in some way. While Sosinski’s wife, Sandra Sosinski, can agree that the Take 5 would provide a service, she said negative impacts of a development of that stature outweigh the potential positives.
“You ask, ‘Doesn’t an oil change serve the community?’” Sandra Sosinski asked. “Well, yes, but is out of character with the other development that’s here.”
The planning board will debate the proposal May 2. Its recommendation will move to a Sarasota County Commission agenda for a final decision.
Contact Herald-Tribune Growth and Development Reporter Heather Bushman at hbushman@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @hmb_1013.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Osprey residents rally against potential Take 5 oil change
