LUTZ - The northern stretch of North Dale Mabry Highway won't turn into a chain of strip malls, but could look like a strip of residential-styled offices.

Under a preliminary proposal presented Tuesday, densities on hundreds of acres of undeveloped property fronting the roadway could double or quadruple at certain locations, and buildings could be built closer to the road.

The potential changes would serve as a transition between parcels bordering the roadway and ones with higher residential densities behind them.

The changes were proposed by Hillsborough County planners overseeing an update of the North Dale Mabry Overlay District, county regulations adopted in 1989 that guide development in the 3-mile corridor and cluster commercial uses at three intersections.

About 25 parcels could see densities increase. Most are adjacent to the highway, near the existing activity centers, and are zoned for one home per acre. A few form pods on the west side of Sunlake Boulevard south of Lutz-Lake Fern Road and at the intersection of Holly Lane and Dale Mabry.

The proposed changes call for:

•Allowing four dwelling units per acre and residential scale office uses on parcels in the urban service area on the west side of Dale Mabry. A section west of Sunlake Boulevard also would be allowed light commercial uses.

•Allowing two dwelling units per acre and residential scale office uses in the rural service area on the east side of Dale Mabry.

•Requiring new development to adhere to specific architectural standards and building features.

•Reducing the required buffer along Dale Mabry from the existing 40 feet to 20 feet on the west side and to 30 feet on the east side of the highway.

The proposed changes would trigger modifications in the county's long-range comprehensive plan, future land-use plan, as well as the Lutz Community Plan, said Pedro Parra, a planner with the Hillsborough Planning Commission.

The proposal met with disgust from Lutz resident Denise Layne, who said increasing densities along the highway would erode the area's rural lifestyle that the Lutz Community Plan was designed to protect.

She proposed eliminating the committee and keeping the overlay district as is.

'The whole idea of the Dale Mabry plan is to curb and not blend in and not infill,' Layne said.

Layne said residents who helped develop the community plan recognized that pockets of higher residential densities existed but believed keeping densities to 1-acre lots would keep the higher densities from proliferating.

She said if property owners want to develop something more intense, they can seek an amendment to the comprehensive plan. That way, compatibility can be assessed on a case-by-case basis, she said.

'You can develop every piece of property along this Dale Mabry corridor and don't think you can't,' she said. 'I am outraged. You don't get to have a hotel on every piece of property on Dale Mabry. This is wrong. This is very wrong.'

Committee members who supported the changes own property along the corridor and asked specifically about their particular tracts and what could be built.

Norm Tyson, who owns property at the southeast corner of Dale Mabry and Holly Lane, said he would like to see densities bumped up even more, with a commercial use for his property.

'Dale Mabry in Lutz is no longer a sleepy community,' he said. 'Where are your farms, your orange groves? Where is this rural community? It's not here, and if you think it's here you're asleep.'

Eli Alvarado, the county planner overseeing the committee, said the county is proposing two dwelling units per acre and residential scale office uses for that corner and not commercial, because the east side of Dale Mabry falls in the rural service area.

The committee will continue debating the changes at its next meeting Oct. 16. An open house to present the preliminary changes to the community is slated for the end of October.

Reporter Elizabeth Lee Brown can be reached at (813) 865-1502 or ebrown@tampatrib.com.