Other action
Also during their meeting Tuesday night, Forsyth County’s planning board reviewed:
* A request by 1699 Land Company LLC to build a 97-lot single family residential district (Res-3) subdivision on 39 acres on Pleasant Grove Road adjacent to the Williams Point neighborhood in northwest Forsyth.
* O’Dwyer Properties LLC’s application to rezone from A1 to master planned district (MPD) some 18 acres at Kelly Mill and Bethelview roads in west Forsyth for 50 residential lots and 40,000 square feet of commercial space with 202 parking lots
-- Kayla Robins
EAST FORSYTH — An application for a potential car dealership on Highway 20 east of Cumming, the fourth on that corridor in the last two years, will come before Forsyth County’s planning board on Feb. 24.
The Toyota/Scion dealership is being touted to its would-be neighbors as a modern automotive sales and service establishment.
The plan by Southeast Toyota Distributors and Beaver Toyota calls for an 81,000-square-foot facility at Buford Highway and Echols Road to include 1,098 parking spaces, a collision center and car wash.
BC Real Estate Holdings LLC submitted the rezoning request for 26.5 acres. Most of the property, which includes four parcels, is currently zoned as agricultural, or A1, and would be changed to a highway business district, or HB.
If ultimately approved by the county commission, the Toyota/Scion dealership would join: Lou Sobh Honda, which opened in late 2013 at the highway and Sanders Road; Lob Sobh Kia, which is under construction next door to the Honda site; and a Q Automotive dealership, for which an 8-acre tract nearby was rezoned in October.
As proposed, the Toyota/Scion dealership would be the largest of the four. The Honda center is 50,000 square feet and has about 500 vehicles on site.
Discussion at the planning board’s work session Tuesday night — with District 3 member Greg Dolezal absent and District 4’s Alan Neal recused — focused on Echols Road traffic and the creation of a four-way traffic light.
The board consensus was that Holly Court could be connected to Echols from the south to create an intersection at Buford Highway.
Echols is a concern for traffic, with school buses traveling to and from nearby Haw Creek Elementary and Lakeside Middle schools. In addition, Haw Creek Park borders the Toyota site to the northeast, with its entrance also on Echols.
The light should address those backups, board members agreed.
However, the potential of creating a left-turn into the dealership from Echols for parts deliveries and test-drive customers could complicate matters.
Without the left turn, drivers would have to make a U-turn on the highway to turn right into the lot.