Developers’ vision for Napa Pipe is coming into focus, and they want Napa County residents to envision it, too.

Where the dry dock stands along the Napa River on the south county site, developers beckon to you to imagine a lively outdoor theater. Where cranes bow down to an industrial skyline, they ask you to picture 2,580 homes and an array of parks, restaurants and stores.

Even the skeptical at Wednesday’s Napa County Planning Commission meeting, where architects for Napa Pipe described their would-be creations, acknowledged the images were enticing. But for all the pictures that flashed across the screen, opponents battled back with one pointed word: “city.”

The purpose of Wednesday’s hearing was to give commissioners and the public an understanding of how the Napa Pipe proposal came to be. But when one architect slipped up and referred to the carefully proclaimed “neighborhood” as a “town,” he mistakenly touched upon one of the most highly charged debates surrounding the development proposed for the 152-acre site in south Napa County. Just what is Napa Pipe? Is it a neighborhood? A town? A city outside of a city?

Bill Rawn, the Boston-based architect who is part of the Napa Pipe design team, expressed architects’ desire to “ensure there is a sense of neighborhood” at Napa Pipe.

He showed images of the “shopping and recreation that serve the population of the Napa Pipe neighborhood,” which would include a restaurant, outdoor theater and hotel. He also noted the employment opportunities at Napa Pipe, which would feature light industrial and office space, as well as a senior housing facility.

“It’s a mixture of uses; that is very important,” Rawn said.

Rawn said the nearly 3,000 homes would include “a series of different housing units,” from modest houses to medium-sized townhouses to apartments, thereby creating “a truly mixed community” with residents from a variety of income levels.

“It is all about letting the street life of the community being part of the neighborhood,” Rawn said, adding, “All this leads to a compact building design … (with a) sufficient population to support these goals.”

Napa Pipe architects are doing their best to ensure an environmentally friendly community, he said, with an emphasis on walking, biking and possibly traveling by train and water taxi to one of the 7,000 jobs located within three miles of the site.

Architect Doug Johnston, also of William Rawn Associates, told of the active river uses proposed at Napa Pipe, and his vision for gatherings at the waterfront, of boating and dining and entertainment.

Buildings, he said, would be designed in such a way as to “enliven the street with balconies, stoops overhangs.”

“Housing is the basic element of any great neighborhood,” he said.

Philadelphia landscape architect Dennis McGlade described plans for a variety of parks at Napa Pipe, including a park along the railroad, one along the waterfront and “more rugged and wild open space” throughout the site.

“An open space structure for Napa Pipe is very, very important,” he said.

But when McGlade accidentally referred to his vision for the “town of Napa Pipe,” murmurs erupted through the audience. McGlade quickly corrected himself, clarifying that the Napa Pipe development would be a “community.”

Not all members of the public were convinced.

Francie Winnen of Napa asked the developer to clarify “what the definition of a town is.”

Harold Kelly, a slow-growth advocate from Napa, took the criticism one step further, calling Napa Pipe “a city outside the city” of Napa.

“I think to build a city next to the city is the wrong approach,” he said.

Napa County Farm Bureau Executive Director Sandy Elles complimented the developers’ “all-star team” and “fascinating presentation,” but said that her concern is “not the design of the project but the scale of the project.”

Developer Keith Rogal attempted to allay concerns about the size of Napa Pipe. “This is a neighborhood,” he said, suggesting Napa Pipe would be a neighborhood in much the same way Browns Valley in Napa is a neighborhood.

“The retail is quite a small amount … (only) that which meets the daily needs” of Napa Pipe residents, he said. “It is not by any stretch the kind of center that becomes a city, a town. It is a neighborhood.”

 Bob Fiddaman, chairman of the planning commission, responded to additional environmental concerns raised Wednesday, assuring the public, “This is just the beginning of a very length process.”

Now that the public comment period for the environmental impact review has come to an end, consultants and county officials are busy in the hopes of producing a draft EIR by summer, Napa County Planning Director Hillary Gitelman said.

The county plans to schedule a series of evening public workshops on Napa Pipe, about six in total, she said. Each workshop will focus on a new issue related to Napa Pipe, such as water and traffic.

The first meeting will be scheduled for some time in mid-March, Gitelman said, and will focus on smart growth and other design issues related to Napa Pipe.