What got these 200 Boiseans upset Wednesday night
A Boise development company ran into fierce opposition a year ago when it proposed building 307 townhouses, single-family homes and apartments on both sides of West Hill Road Parkway in Northwest Boise.
On Tuesday, Trilogy Development unveiled a slightly smaller development. But it didn’t seem to sit any better with most of the 200 people who crowded into the cafeteria at Shadow Hills Elementary School for a neighborhood meeting Tuesday evening . The fight pits the developer against neighbors concerned about the loss of farmland in a once-rural area nestled against the Boise Foothills.
The revised plan is for the Prominence subdivision, bordered by Bogart Lane to the east and Duncan Lane to the west and bisected by Hill Road Parkway. The plan now calls for 287 housing units, including 83 townhouses, 74 single-family homes and up to 130 apartments. The original plan called for 134 townhouses, 53 single-family homes and 120 apartments.
“We have a lot of variety,” said Jane Suggs, a senior land use consultant in Boise with WHPacific Inc. who represents Trilogy.
Trilogy, she said, plans to submit an application to the city of Boise in the next few days.
Neighbors who lined up 10 deep at a microphone raised concerns about increased traffic congestion on main roads as well as side streets, water runoff from the 38.4-acre development, and potential harm to deer and other wildlife. Residents also worried that property values could be harmed by the presence of the apartment complex.
“It’s not safe to live in this area now, and it will get worse,” one woman said, referring to traffic. She said she lives west of the proposed development.
The Ada County Highway District has plans to widen Hill Road Parkway from two lanes to five. The plan is in the district’s Capital Improvement Plan but hasn’t been finalized.
Most of the single-family homes, 43, would have garages in back. Seventy-seven of the townhouses would also have garages in the rear.
Not counting the apartment complex, which would be designed for people ages 55 and older, the density of the development would have 4.8 dwelling units per acre. That’s similar to other nearby developments, Suggs said, which have from 3.8 units to 5.4 per acre. Counting the apartments, the density would be 7.5 units per acre.
Trilogy will ask the Boise City Council for a zone change to R-1C, which allows up to eight units per acre. The current R-1A zone was established when the area was annexed into the city in 2014 and 2015. It allows 2.1 units per acre.
If the plan gets submitted in the next few days, Suggs said the application could come before the city Planning and Zoning Commission in April and before the City Council in May or June. She said neighbors could also ask the ACHD Commission to hold a hearing.
Because Trilogy held a neighborhood meeting in November 2017, it was not required to hold a second one. But Suggs said Trilogy, a Boise company owned by John Laude Sr., wanted neighbors to know what changes had been made.
Dennis Dunn, who lives nearby and is vice president of the North West Neighborhood Association, said the changes proposed by the development are “so dramatic” that they are incompatible with the neighborhood. The association will continue to fight the proposal.
“We are here for the long haul,” Dunn said. “And we don’t see this as just a neighborhood issue. We see it as a citywide issue.”
This story was originally published February 20, 2019 at 10:14 PM.
