::: COMMUNITY NEWS

Planning group gives tentative OK to development near South Course lake

Published Tuesday, April 30, 2002

South developer Reynen & Bardis has received an advisory panel's conditional approval to develop one of the three subdivisions it recently acquired.

The Cosumnes Community Planning Advisory Council, a citizens' review that is part of the county planning process, last week approved the map for Lakeview, a 181-unit subdivision on 40 acres in Murieta South, providing two conditions are satisfied.

Lakeview, east of the South Course lake and 11th hole, has the highest density of the three projects. It requires a variance allowing some lots to be three times deeper than they are wide.

All three subdivisions have tentative maps approved by county planning in the 1990s. The Greens has 119 units and the Crest has 61.

The advisory group conditioned its approval of Lakeview on a reexamination of the environmental impacts the project will have, with particular emphasis on the traffic effects.

“I think there should be some reformulation,” said CCPAC chair Gary Cortopassi, pointing out that impact evaluation methods have improved and conditions have changed since the early 1990s.

The board also stipulated that building permits be withheld by the county until Reynen & Bardis provides a transportation systems management plan for Murieta South. The developer has twice failed to appear before CCPAC with a plan that fulfills trip reduction requirements mandated by the county.

The CCPAC board characterized the estimated impacts of the project, especially with regard to traffic on the Highway 16 corridor, as outdated. “Developers should have some obligation” to address traffic problems their projects contribute to, said Cortopassi.

The board rejected the argument advanced by Todd Chambers, the Reynen & Bardis representative, who said the impacts were accounted for in the master plan for Rancho Murieta and in environmental reviews and updates prepared over the years.

John Kershaw, a CCPAC member who lives in Rancho Murieta, asked Chambers about a river crossing to connect North and South. Kershaw said it was a “key issue” in the trip-reduction transportation plan required by the county.

It is also a condition of development in the South. Every subdivision map carries the requirement that a river crossing for pedestrians and bicyclists be in place by the time the 601st unit is built on the South. Reynen & Bardis’ current development phase will bring the number of units to more than 580, according to Rancho Murieta Association General Manager Greg Vorster. Any of the three new subdivisions will trigger the crossing requirement.

Chambers, who represents Reynen & Bardis on the community’s Parks Committee, told the council he thought the 651st unit was the trigger. He said someone else in the Reynen & Bardis organization was working to meet the deadline. He pointed out that Reynen & Bardis had already successfully fulfilled another development obligation -- the installation of the South traffic light.

The traffic light was mandated to be installed by the 361st unit. In June 2000, the 366th unit was done and Reynen & Bardis had 40 more units under construction. The RMA asked the county to withhold occupancy permits until Reynen & Bardis complied with the traffic signal requirement. The traffic signal went into operation in December 2001.

The Lakeview subdivision will next be reviewed by the county planning department.