Mega-village

Behind the effort to create the largest residential development in county history

(Aug. 5, 2010) Until a few years ago, the biggest planned residential development in county history was Shelter Cove, site of the infamous late-‘60s real estate swindle in which unscrupulous developers tried to sell thousands of residential lots, many of them unbuildable, on the remote, singularly beautiful — but tectonically violent — Lost Coast. Most of the lots never sold, and many of the ones that did remain in a spin cycle of foreclosures (“The Shelter Cove Saga,” Aug. 28, 2003). The social and political backlash from developments like Shelter Cove led to new development restrictions (including the creation of the California Coastal Commission) and helped fuel a movement that would later be dubbed “smart growth.”

On paper, Ridgewood Village, a mixed-use commercial and residential development slated for the Cutten-Ridgewood area, just south of Eureka city limits, looks like the very embodiment of smart-growth ideals. The project includes such progressive concepts as walkability, open spaces, mixed-use buildings and a firm rejection of “big box” retailers. Ridgewood Village is also the largest, most ambitious master-planned development ever proposed in Humboldt County. (Shelter Cove gets disqualified for being make-believe.)

Detail of Ridgewood Village Conceptual Master Plan.

GALLERY >

This is something of a paradox. Smart growth usually focuses on infill, strategically focusing development within the limits of existing city infrastructure. Ridgewood Village is different. By North Coast standards — hell, any standards — the project as currently proposed is simply massive in scope: Three hundred eighty-six acres of timberland — currently zoned residential low density — would be developed in nine stages between 2012 and 2030, eventually yielding up to 1,442 residential units, including single-family homes as well as town houses and apartments for seniors and low-income residents. On the southern 66 acres, developers would erect a 327,000-square-foot commercial district (about half the size of the Bayshore Mall) with a grocery store and various smaller businesses on the ground floor, office space and apartments above, and below, an underground parking lot. Five neighborhood parks would be complemented by more than 200 acres of working community forest, which, if all goes as planned, will be donated to a nonprofit conservation group.

The developer is Forster-Gill, a timber and property-management firm based in San Luis Obispo, though the Gill family has local roots, as do project partners Scott Dunn and the Robinson family. To achieve their vision, the developers have asked the county to do four things: Change the zoning on the three existing parcels, approve the subdivision of those parcels, certify a 3,300-page Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) and enter into a development agreement that will guide all future stages of the project.

Easier said than done.

As details of the Ridgewood Village plans have emerged, residents of the surrounding neighborhoods have grown more and more concerned. They’ve kept tabs on the project since the initial community meetings in early 2007, and now, with the project proposals about to move from the county planning agency to the Board of Supervisors for approval, their protestations have taken on a heightened urgency. At the July 15 Planning Commission meeting, area residents — their demeanors ranging from clinical to livid — characterized Ridgewood Village as a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Its so-called “smart growth” amenities are mere window dressing, they claimed, for a massive, poorly planned nightmare of a development that will forever transform their quiet neck of the woods into a dangerous, traffic-clogged mess, one whose long-term costs will be foisted upon taxpayers.

Project Manager Mike Atkins, a longtime forestry worker turned consultant, sympathizes, to an extent, with the public’s reservations. “It’s a master-planned project, so it looks really big — frighteningly large,” he concedes. Last week, as he walked along the dusty ridge-top logging road that will someday become Ridgewood Hills Drive, Atkins said the project’s size can be misleading. Growth, he pointed out, will happen one way or another. “Look at McKinelyville,” he said, referencing the town he himself lives in. “They had almost 1,000 units approved in the last decade, and nobody blinked an eye — because nobody put it on a single piece of paper.” That town’s haphazard, leapfrogging sprawl is often cited by smart-growthers as an example of how not to proceed with community development. This tract, on the other hand, has been slated for development since the early ‘80s, and Ridgewood Village, he said, is precisely the type of project the county has been asking for.

So which is it? Is Ridgewood Village an example of a big-picture developer finally doing things the right way? Or is it a Trojan horse cloaked in the vestments of smart growth, just waiting to unleash congestion, blight and public endangerment?

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12 Comments

Comment / By Goldie / Aug. 6, 2010, 1:02 p.m.

Ryan, What does this mean, “As for the DEIR, Atkins pointed out that it’s not Forster-Gill’s document — they simply paid for it. The county was responsible for guiding the process — hiring the consultants, compiling their reports and preparing the document. “Ultimately,” Atkins said, “we have to fall on what the experts say.” Does it mean the county worked with and hired the consultants and is responsible for the document? I know is says that but is it true?

Comment / By Ryan Burns / Aug. 6, 2010, 1:45 p.m.

Yes. The DEIR is a county document, prepared by the Community Development Services Department.

Comment / By sweet me / Aug. 6, 2010, 7:51 p.m.

I wouldl love to see some kind of businesses brought to this area for existing people to sustain themselves. Retirees from out of the area are welcome to be here and to feed here, but let us work out our own failed economy problems first. When we can sustain the local population first, then we can invite in those from out of the area that wish to regulate and decide what is best for this area. Please, let us welcome our own first. Those who are tired from the rat race and throw money at a no growth community. Please, some of us wish to excell in our place of birth, where our families live and our friends are. We just want what you had from whereever you came from. There are other nomadic places for you to choose.

Comment / By Buzz / Aug. 6, 2010, 11:34 p.m.

Yeah, right. Good luck with that plan Sweety.

Comment / By Super Colossal Mega / Aug. 7, 2010, 9:01 a.m.

It’s funny that it’s the same people who always complain about freeloaders leeching the system through social services and draining our mutual resources…that are also the most adamant supporters (and money makers) of building the very infrastructure that creates and houses them.

The “marina center” is the same thing. A big thumbs down to both. They’re horrible to be around in the city and they would do far more harm than good here.

Comment / By Goldie / Aug. 7, 2010, 1:54 p.m.

With the inadequacies of the current report we can not be certain that this development will not topple existing infrastructure. Our sewer system needs repair. In 2009 we were told that” to pay for the replacement and improvement of an aging sewer system, Eureka’s residential sewer customers can expect an 87 percent increase over the next five years”. $26.7 million worth of repairs are needed. The report failed to address police and fire services, or traffic concerns. Pretty pictures, yes, and very lovely words but the very things that allow for healthy community life are absent.

Comment / By dksjlfjs / Aug. 9, 2010, 10:08 a.m.

It’s absurd to develop such a project and not be discussing annexation of the property. This is a leech on the city of Eureka unless it is PART of the city of Eureka. It is well-demonstrated throughout the entire United States that cities that are able to annex the development on their edges thrive and those that cannot fail.

The only reason to build on the outskirts of a city is to get the services offered by that city (including jobs, utilities, etc) without paying taxes into that city or being subject to the rules of the city (which of course are necessary to provide the services). Any such development is always bad news as by its very nature it is designed to suck resources without contributing its share.

Without annexation such a project is guaranteed to be flawed.

Beyond that this is clearly your standard-developer fluff talk about what will happen down the road. Inertia is a strong force and once such a development begins be assured that it will proceed. All elements deemed critical to approval must be locked-in during the approval process now, not negotiated after the project is underway or phase one is complete.

I support such a development in principal and the location can work. But it must be viewed an extension of the city, the street grid, the utilities, the mixed-use zoning, etc. These little “hamlet” villages that are built on the outskirts of cities around the country are disastrous for development, planning and the life of cities. A project such as this can work but we must be diligent and make our demands and stick to them.

1400 units and a fire station is not required? Are you kidding? three streets? are you kidding?

The traffic mitigation is to put 8 traffic lights in Eureka? How does that help anybody? It just means you’ll spend more time waiting at lights. If you’re going to add a wing onto the city you have to re-imagine more infrastructure than just putting up some new lights on existing thoroughfares. Entire streets have to be designated as transport routes, parking may have to be removed, an overpass may need to be built, etc.

This is not a “residential development” it is an expansion of the city. It must be self-sufficient to a degree. Ask yourself if these properties could be sold and developed if they were not immediately adjacent to the city of Eureka. Of course not, because it’s not contributing anything back, merely being tacked-on to the city.

This has the potential to be an enormously good development but in its current configuration it is not that. Demand that it be done correctly because you’ll be living with the consequences for the rest of your life.

We can do better. If the developer can’t get this project done right then so be it. We do not need this, just like we do not need Marina Center, if it cannot be done within a more intelligent planning process.

Comment / By srsly? / Aug. 9, 2010, 8:46 p.m.

First of all, this has nothing to do with Skilled Healthcare. Second, the abuses of which they have been deemed guilty are heinous and led to death and suffering for many victims, families and society at large. The verdict is entirely acceptable.

A juror “lied” to get on the jury? You’ve got to be kidding me. What, some defense attorney didn’t get to cherry pick the “jury of your peers” in the manner in which they felt entitled? Boo hoo! I guess the other jurors were all swayed by that one fox in the henhouse huh.

Comment / By Brian / Aug. 10, 2010, 10:19 a.m.

This is by far the worst thing that could ever happen to our community. Let’s devalue all the housing in the area and flood this whole area with traffic. Let’s take away everything good about cutten so that some cheap housing can go up and some company can rape the land. Why don’t they just burn down the whole town why they are at it, what a disgusting example of the way people act on this planet.

Comment / By Neal Latt / Aug. 17, 2010, 11:36 p.m.

“dksjlfjs” made the best points to make in this discussion so far, IMHO. Eureka should annex this development to better control its effects and capture its potential revenues. Beyond that, there are many laudable elements to this development: its walkability, its high ratio of forest/park acreage to total residences, land the fact that it provides for much of its own basic retail services, to reduce car trips in and out - are just some of them. Nothing’s perfect. But this proposed development indisputably will hit many of the targets.

It is curious to me that city staffers like Sidnie Olson are so critical of traffic studies done by the exact same consultants as the ones done for her pet project, the Marina Center. Could this be that the Marina Center was HER document, and this one done by rivals at the county? Or is this just a tired old extension of Eureka city politics, where because this project is being developed by someone other than the “good ol’ boys,” their defenders on city staff were instructed to come out swinging?

(Psst: I say it’s some of both.)

Comment / By M. McKenzie / Aug. 28, 2010, 1:30 p.m.

I have created a pictorial tour of the dirt road that traverses the proposed land for those who have not or are not able to walk the 1.5 mile distance.

Link:

http://www.ridgewoodvillage.blogspot.com/

I think it helps to see what will be affected or eliminated by this development.