Future development must avoid sensitive riverfront locations.

Booklet summarizes smart growth recommendations for various urban and rural locations.

Concerned about recently proposed, intensive riverfront development projects such as Haymount, The Chesapeake Bay Foundation hired Dodson Associates and LandEthics to develop guidelines for small-scale, environmentally sustainable projects in the Rappahannock River basin. Detailed plans were developed for three actual sites along the river, demonstrating existing conditions as well as typical and recommended development patterns. Recommended development featured open space development techniques, extensive riverfront buffer zones, traditional development patterns and architectural styles and environmental waste management technology. The results of the project were published by CBF in their 1996 manual: A Better Way to Grow: For More Livable Communities and a Healthier Chesapeake Bay.

Detailed plans for actual sites recommended open space development as a way to reduce impacts and enhance community character.