Varina’s fight to preserve its rural character

“Varina is the forgotten child of Henrico.”

Like many Eastern Henrico residents, Angela Mastrovito does not want the Varina District to become a cookie-cutter suburb filled with big retail chains, car-to-car traffic, and endless urban sprawl.

But Henrico’s most agricultural district is at a “very important crossroads,” said residents, facing the possibility of incoming development and population growth. And many Varina residents are adamant that the district cannot become another Short Pump, Western Henrico’s densely-populated commercial hub.

“Henrico is a huge area, and the population and culture and community in Varina is vastly different than the West End,” said Mastrovito, who has lived in Varina since 2018. “I think if we wanted the West End, we would have embraced it a lot sooner than now.”

On March 9, more than 100 residents met at the Henrico Theatre in Highland Springs to hear from Henrico’s Planning Department, which aims to finalize a new 20-year comprehensive land-use plan – HenricoNEXT, or Henrico 2045 – by the end of the year.

The department has proposed a new initiative aimed at preserving almost all of the eastern half of Varina as rural or agricultural zones. About a quarter of that land would be under a new zoning designation – Prime Agriculture/Rural Conservation (PARC) – which would require a density of one residence per five acres.

The change would not affect current zoning classifications on any land but would serve as guide for county officials, the planning commission and the board of supervisors when considering future rezoning cases.

The PARC designation could result in a five-fold reduction in density across more than 23,000 acres of land in Varina, giving the district a “real rural character,” said planner Greg Dale, who is consulting Henrico on the new comprehensive plan.

Many Varina residents are on board with the idea of a PARC designation, especially after seeing the large increase in residential and commercial development in the county over the past two decades.

“This makes perfect sense to me,” said one attendee. “I am really upset and disappointed with what has transpired in Henrico, and I think this is the first move in the right direction that I have seen in 15 years.”

But residents are grappling with the likelihood that population growth in Western Henrico will spill over into Varina, with few undeveloped areas left in the West End and certain areas in Varina, such as land near Route 5 and Osbourne Turnpike, poised for higher-density developments.

The comprehensive plan – a future-looking “vision” for the county – aims to set the parameters for “reasonable growth and change” in the district, said Dale.

“A lot of people don’t want to see change, but we can’t just freeze the county as it currently exists,” he said. “Other people want to have opportunities to come in. You want your children to have places to live when they grow up. So it’s a balancing act.”

Residents: community and character cannot be the cost of new growth

Henrico’s population has grown at about 1% each year, the same rate as the United States as a whole, and is projected to stay on that track, said Dale. The county wants to achieve a balance where new growth essentially pays for itself – funding new public services and infrastructure – but also wants to facilitate growth and development that benefits community members.

“I think that the county is like just about every other county, in that we want to continue to have prosperity. We want to continue to have opportunities for people to live here,” Dale said. “And we want to preserve and protect what makes our community special, because it’s home to us.”

But if more development comes into Varina, community members do not want to see more gas stations or Wawas – establishments that could mark Varina as simply a drive-through community, said Mastrovito. Residents want to see coffee shops, locally-run mom-and-pop stores, and places that define the unique character of Varina.

“Almost everybody wants something that would bring the community together – not a Wawa, another gas station, or a Sheetz that would bring more traffic off I-95 with people driving through,” she said. “But things that would offer a community atmosphere, whether that be a coffee shop or a sandwich shop.”

Community members and the county have been clear this past year: entities like hyperscale data centers cannot become the heart of Henrico, or of Varina. But residents do not want the tides to shift to allow other big industries to dominate Eastern Henrico, said one attendee.

“How do we achieve the growth without losing that culture and that character? We need to be specific about the type of development that we want, to really help drive what we want the East End to look like,” he said. “Because I’m not just thinking about this for myself and my future, I’m looking at the future of my children and making sure that that growth is going to build up our communities.”

County leaders, however, cannot dictate exactly what type of establishments can come into certain areas, said Varina District Supervisor Tyrone Nelson. While the county implements land-use designations and zoning codes, business zones are open to either big retail chains or small mom-and-pop shops, and businesses can choose where in the county to operate.

“We’d love to have local people for everything, but persons have to want to be here,” Nelson said. “The businesses in the West End don’t want to come to the East End. That’s why they’re not there, they don’t feel like they can make enough money or whatever be the case. So that’s why there is a disparity as it relates to choice.”

Other community members are apprehensive about current density increases proposed in areas within Varina, such as land near Osbourne Turnpike and Route 5. Varina’s infrastructure cannot accommodate the significant traffic increase that will occur if those areas are developed, said resident Cecile Sealey.

“I can’t see any way that the traffic will ever be able to be managed along that area into Richmond City,” Sealey said. “And I kind of feel like, once you decide on that land use on those parcels, it’s kind of like hanging out a ‘for sale’ sign to developers.”

Residents have frequently heard from county leaders that growth is inevitable, said Varina community member Gray Montrose, but the community has consistently voiced its desire to keep Varina rural, despite growth in Western Henrico.

“When does it stop? Because that’s what folks mean by growth at all costs, that we have to keep building and building and have more and more people here forever,” Montrose said. “It seems like it’s always going to be more and more and there is no end.”

The planning department already has started drafting some chapters of the comprehensive plan and will hold additional listening sessions with the public this spring, said Planning Director Joe Emerson. The department aims to present a full draft this fall and will hold public hearings on the draft plan before the Henrico Board of Supervisors’ final vote.

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.