This article in the Lexington Herald-Leader really brought home to me how far Nicholasville has come in the past several years. Driving up US 27/Nicholasville Road to Lexington every day for classes, I became very familiar with the spotty storefronts and rolling hills along the way. Now when I visit, it’s almost unrecognizable due to all the new development.
Extending the city limits to the county line seems to be a reasonable notion, especially given that Nicholasville will get some money out of it.
I can see some parallels growing between the north side of Nicholasville and where I live here on the Richmond County line (almost in Martinez). From here I can get to all the good stores in about five minutes, and downtown in about half an hour. Half an hour in the other direction, and I’m out in the boonies. It’s very similar; people near the county line in what will be Nicholasville are right near Fayette Mall and Lexington Green, plus that huge Wal-Mart complex…there is so much commerce right on the south side of Lexington on Nicholasville Road. With the possibility of a 14-screen movie theater, Nicholasville is shaping up a lot like Martinez.
I hope the developers keep trees in mind while they’re changing the landscape. Here in Augusta, we’ve still got trees everywhere. They’re tall, too, so they block sound and visual pollution. The trees in Kentucky don’t grow quite the same way, so I hope they are able to find some way to integrate all the new construction into the environment in an appealing way.