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Thursday, September 13, 2007

Planners Approve Campbell Phase 1

By Lee Ross
Mountain View Telegraph
    The first phase of the Campbell Ranch development got the nod from Edgewood planning officials Monday night.
    The Edgewood Planning and Zoning Commission unanimously approved a preliminary plat for development on a relatively small section of the vast master-planned community. The area presented for approval, north of Frost Road and east of N.M. 14, is 42.33 acres with 88 lots.
    The approval was for conceptual design, which indicates planning commission acceptance of the general outlines of what is proposed but is not a binding commitment.
    For example, the commission approved the plat, but may not accept the lot sizes when it comes to that point. According to Karen Mahalick, the town's planning and development manager, the lot sizes may be too small.
    The concept presented for a portion of Campbell Ranch's Village 2 calls for a combination of clustered housing— housing with small lots and larger open-space areas— and larger, more traditional lots.
    This nearly doubles the amount of open space and helps to make way for more open space and a trail network, said Steven Kellenberg of the California company EDAW Inc., who presented the plat.
    He said the intent, which may not be successful on every lot, is to have some sort of open space— like a park or an undeveloped natural area— within two blocks of every home. He said all housing is set back 75 to 200 feet from N.M. 14.
    "Highway 14 really needs to be preserved," Kellenberg said.
    In addition, commercial areas are planned to be within walking or biking distance of all homes.
    Builders will be asked to vary their home designs and setbacks from the street in an attempt to keep the architecture visually interesting.
    Kellenberg also discussed environmentally friendly buildings, use of winding roads, historic architecture and a number of other elements that are part of the plan for the development.
    In other business Monday, the planning commission tabled final plat approval requests for both Cheyenne Estates and Pueblo Artesanos.
    The proposed 153-acre Cheyenne Estates, annexed as part of the Campbell annexation, is east of N.M. 344 and south of Frost Road.
    The area is zoned to be master planned, which means about 30 percent of the area has to be open space, according to commission member Rey Fulwiler.
    In the Cheyenne Estates plan, some of that open space will actually be owned by homeowners, but they will not be allowed to build on it.
    The plan also calls for a trail network, with a number of trails through homeowners' property.
    That means some home builders will have to create the planned trails themselves, after building is completed, according to the plan.
    "I don't see how they can have an open space trail running through someone's property that they've paid for," said Gary Weddle, who said he has lived on an eight-acre lot to the north of the proposed subdivision for 15 years.
    Weddle also said he is concerned about significant flooding through the property, which he said he has seen twice in the last five years.
    The commission tabled the request and asked the applicant to come back with a few changes.
    The Pueblo Artesanos subdivision was tabled due to a legal concern over the ownership of Rory Road.
    Just over 70 acres in all, the area is north of Hill Ranch Road and east of Horton Road.
    The request was to begin work on 24 lots, but it was tabled until the town attorney can look at the road issue.
    If the road cannot be used as a second access road the plan could not be approved.
    "I could not let this plat go forward with only one ingress and egress," Mahalick said.
    Two other subdivision requests seen Monday night were approved.
    The commission gave the nod to a final plat for phase one of Equestrian Park, which includes 25 lots of the planned 208-acre subdivision south of Frost Road and west of Horton Road.
    Also, a one-year extension of the deadline for Sandia Airpark North's preliminary plat was approved.
    Sandia Airpark is south of Venus Road and east of N.M. 344. The plat for the northern portion of the subdivision was approved in October 2005, according to Mahalick.
    Steve Woodard and George Gonzales, the landowners and developers for Sandia Airpark, said there were problems with funding but that those problems will be resolved before the extension expires.