Elon’s town council has rezoned an irregularly-shaped parcel at University Drive’s juncture with Cook Road to allow its owner to squeeze more homes onto the property’s 1.16-acre footprint.
In a 4-to-1 decision on Tuesday, the council agreed to shift this triangular tract from a suburban residential zone to a denser, urban residential district that its owner, Brian Wagoner, had sought from the town. As part of this change, the council has also removed the parcel from a special overlay district that the town has established along much of the University Drive corridor.
A majority of the council signed off on this two-part decision despite the relatively short period of time since Wagoner had obtained the property’s previous suburban residential zoning.
According to the town’s planning staff, the landowner had secured this designation in 2022 to replace an industrial label that harked back to the tract’s previous existence as the eastern protuberance of a much larger parcel which was carved up by the construction of University Drive…