" This is outrageous! Local citizens contributing to protect our environment are pilloried to support get rich schemes of Seattle carpetbaggers? Local citizen’s monitoring of developer’s machinations are reviled by the mouthpiece of an institution which plays the religious card to intimidate they very same planners they do not want “micromanaged”. This same mouthpiece, which has vigorously voiced its displeasure, imagining the apocalypse with every farm truck, wants the County to spend its resources to smooth the way for cars for 1,000 new Eco-villagers who miraculously add water to Howell Mountain. Puhleeeze!

Angwin has the same population it had 30 years ago although many more are commuting downhill to work with the decline of opportunities at PUC. For a learned man to call this a small city exhibits either the depths of cynicism or profound self-deception. "

" ProAngwin, your comment is exactly why I cannot support SRA. Everything is so over the top no one can believe anything SRA says. Seattle carpetbaggers? Please, they are outstanding developers who have done other innovative and environmentally friendly projects.

Angwin is a college town, a small one, but it is not a rural location. It has houses on neighborhood streets for goodness sake.

This is a very small project in the overall scheme of things. PUC is a good neighbor who has been promised some use of their land for decades, and anyone who moved there in that time knows or should have known they were there and had that property.

PUC has bent over backward to accomodate the community and all they get is over the top, inaccurate insults like your comment. "

" Have you noticed what Triad developed in Lagoon Valley? Have you noticed what they developed in Vallejo? So what California project have these Seattle carpetbaggers built that impresses you? And while you are at it, please tell us about this “overall scheme” you refer to. "

" Napablogger: I know folks who live in the Triad development in Lagoon Valley. They desperately want out but the "community" has such a bad rap, due to poor development, that no one will buy. Do your research on TRIAD. They move in, develop poorly, do not provide what they promised and then skeedaddle with their pockets full your money, having only met their barest minimum for permits and contract purposes. They are slippery indeed. "

" I believe that PUC is following a trend right now of changing the characteristic of a college from rural to urban to attract students (students out of high school today tend to gravitate toward urban settings whereas many students from the past desired rural settings). You can read about it in this article titled "Rural Colleges Seek New Edge and Urbanize" New York Times. What's also apparent is that these rural colleges are using "Education" to gain approval of housing development around campus.

The NY Times article uses Hendrix College as an example of an urbanized campus. But if you look at a map, a major highway travels through the area. The terrain is flat and sparsely wooded in comparison to Angwin. Some areas simply do not lend themselves to urbanization. This is a trend we cannot afford to follow here.

Another problem is that trends tend to change. The "urban" trend could quickly be followed by a "back to the earth" rural trend. Not too many rural colleges will be available at the rate they are being converted into urban settings. The sad thing is that planners have allowed "education" to be used as a tool of manipulation by developers to expand outward into rural areas.

Angwin has some unique characteristics which do not lend itself to "urban". For one thing, we are surrounded by thousands of acres of forestlands which have not been thinned or maintained. We have bottleneck escape routes. Firestorm is a very real threat here. Adding more people and clustered housing to an area with these characteristics is poor planning.

Angwin is not a city. Mistakes made toward urbanization in the past should not be justification for future growth. "

" Oh c'mon, reader.
Very little is selling in Vacaville these days, no matter who built it. Blaming your friends' problems on Triad is unreasonable. "

" If there is a more environmentally sustainable developer than Triad and a more environmentally sustainable community planned for anywhere in the Bay area, please point out the names. I would like to browse their websites and judge for myself. "

" Econut: If you look around, many developers are claiming to be born again eco and most projects have an eco spin. That is what is required to manipulate the approval process these days. Once eco wears out it will be something else. The real justification for developing is profit maximization just as it has always been. These are not eleemosynary institutions. Triad has not built much so there is not much to use for comparison but just the fact that they have advanced the notion of building a 380 unit in one of the least suitable places in the County, if not the state, answers your question. "

" Well, I guess if you hate the idea of profits then ok.

This is one of the least suitable places to build houses in the entire state? Then why are the houses even there, maybe we should tear down the houses that are already there if Angwin is such a horror to live in.

More over the top comments.

We can all just go see what Triad has done. They finished what started out as a botched job by someone else at Hiddenbrooke in Vallejo and it is a really nice neighborhood. It is across 80 going down American Canyon Road. People love living there.

I wish SRA would stop trashing everything and admit that they just don't want the growth. Who does? I have to respect the Foster Rd group for being more honest about this. "

" HMcritic, can you actually NAME a more environmentally progressive developer and a site with more environmentally progressive plans? I would like to compare the websites so I can judge for myself the wisdom of PUC's leadership in choosing Triad. "

" huge hunks of money to hire consultants ? look who's calling the kettle black. i was promised an answer to my question about how much p.u.c. was spending on consultants and lawyers but got no official answer. what a waste is right. that unknown amount of money , which is surely more than sra will ever raise , could have been used to add to the endowment. people who come to live here prefer a rural area to a city. they don't want to pay $20,000 a person or house to build a police station and a big building for the mayor and other funtionaries(city council etc.).making angwin a city is a way cooked up by p.u.c. officials to pay for the infrastructure needed to accomodate the huge development of 40% that even no city would contemplate. real estate is down 55% in the county so far, and maybe another 20% in the future. soon there will be affordable homes for teachers without new building. no need to go without refridgerators as is done in eco-villages. no need to work on the farm or walk blocks to your car in the rain.at least sra is transparent about their finances. "

" Ford makes his observations as a former vice president of Pacific Union College, with undying loyalty to his former employer. That loyalty tempts one to make statements which require clarification.

Angwin does have a number of ” businesses,” but many of those he lists are just a guy operating out of his home. The business center is far too small to justify calling Angwin a small city.

The village is considered rural by the County for several reasons. The density is low, because most homes are on large parcels, not your typical city lots. About two-thirds of the households depend on a private well in the backyard or the Howell Mountain Mutual Water Co. The State would frown on the water company serving a larger population. Except for college housing, the community depends on private septic systems.

Except for three blocks alongside the college, there are no curbs and gutters or sidewalks in the entire village. There are two short bikeways.

This does not sound like an urban area, a place to plunk down 380 more households. The infrastructure is just too skeletal.

Ford likes to bash vineyardists, but his college has sold or attempted to sell three very large parcels for vineyards. The third sale was stopped by a local hero who bought the land to preserve as woodlands forever.

College administrators have never supported slow growth programs and have no credentials in environmental causes. The eco-village has been, from Day One, just a marketing scam. This kind of duplicity, this masquerading, is ruing the college's reputation.

Finally, the EIR is not being done by County planners. It is being done by a company selected by the developer. "

" Econut: As you no doubt know, that would be any developer who, when approached by a landowner confiding their ambition to place 1000 new residents on top of Howell Mountain, would kindly inform them that was a bad bad idea and politely excuse themselves. It would be interesting to know which developers did precisely that. Triad would no doubt agree with this. Their marketing campaign for their yet to be realized Lagoon Valley leads with the promise that at Lagoon Valley there will be “a 2:1 jobs/housing balance with 750,000 square feet of offices connected to 1,025 residences.” Their lack of plausible response when faced with this reality in Angwin should concern all. Even Hiddenbrooke, which Triad took over midstream and thus should not be faulted, reports that over half of the residents commute between half and one hour EACH WAY, to work and back. That is eco? "