As myregion.org progresses, community leaders have already discovered new and innovative businesses, organizations and initiatives through the project’s community outreach - each one demonstrating the importance of partnerships and regionalism to the Central Florida area.

Recently, the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council (ECFRPC) partnered with Lake County Government, the Homebuilders Association of Lake County and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to create an Ecological Design Manual for Lake County. Funding for the project was provided, in part, by a grant awarded to the ECFRPC by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission through the Florida Advisory Council on Environmental Education program.

The purpose of the manual is to offer practical techniques for integrating development objectives and natural resource protection needs into the design of new residential subdivisions. It is based on the belief that residents and homebuilders desire to protect a community’s water and related wildlife resources, yet are not always aware of the critical role design can play in enhancing or disrupting natural corridors and systems.

Lake County is rural but growing. Development pressure from the expanding Orlando Metropolitan Area continues to press in on the county’s natural features and assets. These include over 1,200 lakes and large portions of regional resources such as the Wekiva River, Lake Apopka, the Green Swamp and the Ocala National Forest.

The pace of this urban growth will increase with the completion of the Western Beltway, which will place most of Lake County within a 35-minute commute to downtown Orlando and major employment centers in and around the Disney and Universal Studios theme park areas.

“As Central Florida continues to grow, changes brought by development are so strong that it is difficult to retain the same character it would have had if development were not present,” said Jeff Jones, project director at the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council and Technical Director for myregion.org. “However, it is possible to intentionally design projects so they contribute to an area’s sense of place while preserving the area’s most important ecological attributes.

Ultimately, the publication, entitled Ecological Design Manual for Lake County, illustrates how – through the application of design principles and techniques – open spaces within developments can be conserved, so they form part of an interconnected system that protects the most important components of the natural area. Exhibited within the manual are 12 development scenarios demonstrating how residents, homebuilders and elected officials can use the basic concepts of conservation to arrange homes so as to preserve up to 80 % of the site as meaningful open space.

“Conservation design provides the county with an important tool for managing its fast paced growth,” said Commissioner Catherine Hanson, Lake County Commissioner. “The large areas of open space can serve to protect environmental resources, preserve an area’s rural character and offer the quality lifestyle residents have come to expect from Lake County.”