Jenny Thomas makes the most out of Oak Hill. Throughout the day, Thomas, who owns Oak Hill Florist, finds time to drop off her dry cleaning, go to the bank and grab lunch at Chowderheads.

“I use everything in the plaza,” she said.

Though Thomas is able to take care of her chores with quick trips from her store, she’d like to see more people walking around the plaza, popping in and out of shops. With the high school, Memorial Park and the municipal building across the street, Oak Hill, she said, is already the center of town. New zoning planned to bring in more small businesses, housing and walkways could help make it feel more like a town center.

On Wednesday, the Scarborough Town Council will vote on proposals to establish two new zoning districts for Oak Hill. Currently, the area is a mixture of residential and business zones. The new districts would require that buildings be two-stories high, allow them to be closer to the street and prevent larger box stores from being built in the area altogether.

“Oak Hill has more development potential,” said Town Planner Dan Bacon. The new zones were established to ensure that, when development does occur, the area isn’t overrun by large stores and strip malls.

According to Thomas, though Oak Hill is already “the major intersection in Scarborough,” by adding more sidewalks and landscaping, the town hopes to create the style and character of a village center.

“The plan is to make all of Oak Hill very walkable,” Bacon said.

Though Oak Hill is first to be considered for the zoning change, Dunstan Corner may also be rezoned in an effort to “establish a couple of areas of town where the development is more of the village scale or character,” Bacon said.

Two meetings were conducted this summer to discuss plans for a new sidewalk along Route 1 in Dunstan to replace the dilapidated one currently in place. Last week, following the second of those meetings, town staff also held a discussion about using the new zoning districts in Dunstan. Residents and business owners had questions about where the new sidewalk would be and how the new zoning would restrict them, but the reaction was generally positive, Bacon said.

Businesses owners in Oak Hill are eager to see the changes, which they hope wold bring more walking traffic.

Diana Locke, owner of Paws Applause, said she doesn’t even keep a water bowl outside her pet store like she did at her old shop in Kennebunk, because she never sees people walking by with their dogs.

Locke, who is from Cape Elizabeth, said she moved to Kennebunk for its historic town center, and she believes Scarborough could use something similar.

“It’s a dead zone,” Locke said. “We have no walking traffic.” But she can understand why. When Locke sends one of her workers across the Route 1 intersection to pick up sandwiches at Amato’s, she never knows if she will see her again.

“We call whoever goes over, ‘the frogger,'” Locke said, referring to the video game for which players guide frogs across the street, dodging cars along the way.

“I just think they need to do something,” she said.

John Ham, who has lived in Scarborough for 25 years, agrees. Ham, who is retired, loves to ride his bicycle around town, but he always avoids Oak Hill.

“It’s impossible to cross that intersection,” he said. If new sidewalks were put in and traffic slowed down, Ham believes he would have more options for bike routes.

Still, there are always some people who wouldn’t want to see a change. College students Libby Brackett and Jess Bolton, who graduated from Scarborough High School in 2006, like being able to come home to the same Oak Hill they grew up with.

“I like how it is,” said Brackett. She said she always drives and doesn’t believe she would walk to Oak Hill if the sidewalks were improved.

“The park is good enough,” she said.

Marc Whitaker, who works at Arlberg Ski and Sport Shop, said he thinks if it is easier to cross Route 1, people might be more likely to walk over from the park and shop in the plaza, especially after events like the summer concerts, he said, “instead of just leaving.”

Though some may be satisfied with Oak Hill as it is, vacant buildings and open land indicate that more development is bound for the area. The new zoning gives the town the opportunity to decide who comes in – and more importantly, who stays out.

Jeff Gallant, manager of Ace Hardware, said he is not concerned about losing business to the new Lowe’s store off the turnpike in Scarborough, but he thinks there’s a place for large, retail stores, and Oak Hill isn’t it.

“We’ve got enough box stores in Scarborough, we don’t need them here,” Gallant said. “I think it’s perfect for the town center.”

Walkable Oak Hill? Maybe, with new zoning Walkable Oak Hill? Maybe, with new zoning

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