By Amy Durland
For more than three decades, Saratoga Springs has embraced a unique vision: our community is the “City in the Country.” This is more than a slogan—it is the foundation of an intentional and forward-thinking Comprehensive Plan that recognizes the importance of both our vibrant downtown and the natural areas that surround it.
Saratoga Springs’ urban core and its large Greenbelt area of “rural character” are complementary pieces of a larger whole: the compact city center provides energy, interest, and economic vitality, while the outer Greenbelt delivers ecological resilience, scenic beauty, open spaces, and a sense of place treasured by visitors and residents alike. This “City in the Country” identity is embodied in the city’s 2015 Comprehensive Plan, a document that articulates the city’s land use vision, and upon which our land use and development regulations are based.
This hard-earned balance has always required vigilance. Sometimes developments are proposed that would push against the standards the community has long agreed upon. Instead of reinforcing the values etched into our Comprehensive Plan, some proposals would erode them by wanting the city to bend or reinterpret its standards.
There are calls for creating a new Comprehensive Plan review process. While this is not unreasonable, a Comprehensive Plan review is typically a protracted process that could open the door to an undesirable model of development in the city.
The risks of abandoning our “City in the Country” model are both immediate and long-term:
• Environmental degradation: Large or inappropriate developments in the Greenbelt stand to harm wetlands, wildlife habitats, and ecological systems that protect against flooding and improve our water quality. Once compromised, these resources are nearly impossible to restore.
• Loss of rural character: Saratoga Springs’ appeal is not only its downtown but the striking contrast between a lively city center and the rural landscapes that surround it. Unmitigated sprawl across the Greenbelt would blur this distinction and diminish the city’s defining charm.
• Economic consequences: Tourists are drawn to Saratoga Springs not only for the racetrack or
Broadway but because Saratoga offers something rare: a small vibrant city infused with nature and history. We risk undermining one of our strongest economic drivers if we allow sprawl, sold to the city as “progress,” to replace the community’s Greenbelt. It also detracts from the downtown as our economic center.
• Cumulative impacts: A single inappropriate project might be defended as “not too harmful,” but taken together, each exception sets a precedent. Before long, the protections that have safeguarded our community’s unique identity for over 30 years will unravel.
Saratoga Springs can embrace growth without abandoning the vision that has guided it for decades. Our Comprehensive Plan is more than a suggestion—it is a community blueprint for how to balance vitality and conservation. Let’s keep that vision intact, with citizens actively shaping its direction. Saratoga Springs must continue to be a place where economic vitality thrives alongside nature’s abundance, not at its expense.
