Henrico’s plan to transform Lakeside into the county’s lively, walkable corridor

The Henrico Planning Department has released its finalized draft for a Lakeside “reimagined” – a corridor with apartments atop of small businesses, trees adorning wider sidewalks, public plazas and parks, and less car traffic.

The final plan – which Henrico planners stress is a recommendation rather than a mandate – would revamp the current car-traversed but mostly quiet corridor into a neighborhood emblematic of Richmond’s Carytown. Planners kept almost all of the aspects discussed at last year’s design charrette in the finalized version, including the somewhat controversial bike lanes and reduced car lanes.

The existing Lakeside corridor, stretching from Bryan Park to Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, is flanked by a mix of single-family homes and one-story businesses. Planners are recommending that the county recategorize Lakeside as an Overlay District to increase density along the corridor, allowing townhomes and mixed-use buildings.

The proposal – which will be considered by Henrico’s Board of Supervisors later this summer along with other chapters of the new Comprehensive Plan – would recommend more than 100 new live-work units, more than a dozen four-plexes and 12-plexes, eight new townhomes, and up to nine mixed-use condominium units either be added to the corridor or replace current structures.

An urban center with public meeting spaces

Henrico planners also want to add more public gathering spaces to Lakeside to make the corridor, which sits in the middle of the county just north of the Henrico-Richmond line, a walkable urban center.

The proposal recommends dotting a few community spaces along the corridor:

• a public green stretching between Clarke and Ginter streets flanked by small civic buildings such as a library or town hall;

• a dog park near Oakwood Lane paired with small businesses like a brewery or cafe to bring more activity to the space;

• and a small plaza in front of Lakeside Barbeque with outdoor seating, games, or public art pieces.

The largest gathering space would be a public square in the area of the existing CVS parking lot. The square would be anchored by the Lakeside Farmers’ Market, which would be moved closer to Lakeside Avenue, as well as other small shops and civic buildings. Planners see the square as an ideal place to hold community events, such as concerts and movie nights.

The Hub, Henrico’s first-ever shopping center just south of Hilliard Road, would stay mostly as is, with planners saying the Lakeside should “capitalize on its unique assets, including its vibrant history, locally-owned businesses, and small-town charm.”

Along with public spaces, the proposal would increase density in the corridor by adding new live-work buildings, townhomes, and mixed-use buildings with shops on the ground floor and apartments on the top floors. 

Higher density “urban center” zones – stretches of the corridor closer to Bryan Park and Hilliard Road – would not permit single-family homes but would accommodate apartments and mixed-use buildings. In one version of the plan, a large apartment complex with shops on the ground floor is proposed for the corner of Hillard Road and Lakeside Avenue.

The corridor still would have some “general urban” zones that accommodate lower density buildings like single-family houses and duplexes. 

Less road space, more sidewalks and bike lanes

One of the most controversial aspects of the proposal, which some Lakeside business owners criticized during last year’s charrette, is the reduced car lanes in favor of wider sidewalks and new bike lanes. 

Planners want to reduce Lakeside Avenue from four travel lanes (two on each side) to two, while adding street parking on both sides and bike lanes. The Lakeside corridor currently has no street parking (all parking is in lots) and no existing bike lanes, although new bike lanes already have been planned for some roads.

Sidewalks on Lakeside Avenue would be extended so that they would be continuous, and some of the avenue’s five-feet sidewalks would be expanded to 12-16 feet. Tree medians of up to 22-feet are proposed for parts of Lakeside Avenue, and sidewalks also would have trees, significantly increasing the corridor’s tree coverage.

With the corridor running alongside the new county’s Fall Line biking and walking trail, the speed limit for Lakeside Avenue would be reduced from 35 or 40 mph to just 25 mph, and more crosswalks would be added, allowing the area to be more pedestrian-friendly.

“Many local businesses would benefit from increased foot traffic alongside Lakeside Avenue,” the draft plan reads. “When the design of a street encourages walking, people are more likely to visit multiple businesses. . . Current infrastructure on Lakeside Avenue efficiently forces people to drive, making them more likely to visit a single business and then leave the corridor.”

Some local business owners have voiced concerns about cutting down on car traffic, saying that the shops in the corridor rely on customers that drive to or drive through the area rather than customers that walk through the area.

Planners also have proposed a two-story parking deck either behind Lakeside Barbeque or behind the 7-Eleven on Hilliard Road, blocked from streetview by roadside businesses, so that customers would have more parking spaces.

The flourish of the ‘Garden District’

In an effort to market Lakeside’s unique location between both Bryan Park and Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, planners have promoted the design proposal as Henrico’s new “garden district.”

A small street-facing public plaza is proposed on the corner of Hilliard Road and Lakeside Avenue to serve as an entrance to the botanical garden. Planners also recommended a “landmark tower” in the southern portion of the garden to serve as a “visual connection” between Lewis Ginter and the rest of the corridor.

An idea for a stone arch across Lakeside Avenue at the entrance of the corridor near Bryan Park also was suggested as a marker of the “garden district.”

No funding sources have been identified yet to execute the proposal, said Henrico planner Livingston Lewis, and implementing the plan would require approval from several property owners in the corridor. Property owners with the most significant holdings were “welcomed into the process from the earliest stages of the study,” he said.

“No aspects are inevitable. . . Each property owner will decide what to do with their property, not the county,” Lewis said. “I’m sure there are varied opinions among those individuals about some of the future changes suggested for their parcels.”

The plan, which envisions a Lakeside about 20 years from now, would be largely dependent on the initiative of the corridor’s major property owners, Lewis said.

Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s government and education reporter. Support her work and articles like this one by making a contribution to the Citizen.