Two square miles of undeveloped land just south of town, Biscuit Run, have been bought by Hunter Craig for an astounding $46.2M. The land will be turned into yet another development with a name apparently generated by computer for maximum irony value, “Fox Ridge.” It will include somewhere between 900 and 5,000 residences, which would bring about a significant increase in the Albemarle County population. The Breeden family, who has lived at Biscuit Run for many years now, have kept a chunk of land for themselves to continue to live on. David Hendrick has the story in today’s Progress.
In other news, my old buddy Eric Breeden is now my bestest friend in the whole wide world.
Great just what we need- more development and more unaffordable houses. And of course the County of Albemarle will gladly soak up the infrastructure costs instead of passing them back to the developers and potential home owners.
Now looks like the time to begin real estate speculation down south 29.
Does “900 to 5,000” residences seem just a little vague to anyone else? If the neighborhood model pans out, with mixed use between residential and commercial, this could be useful. Unfortunately most of the commercial development seems to only bring jobs where one wears a paper hat and serves food. When placed near expensive homes it does little to address the transportation impact of a new development.
A few questions:
What type of “affordable housing” (and how exactly they define and implement said “affordable housing”) the County is going to negotiate out of the developers.
Second question will be whether the County will be willing to negotiate appropriate proffers for the needed infrastructure.
Third – what impact will David Slutzky have on how this development is approved?
I imagine and hope that there will be a great deal of gnashing of teeth and debate over the next few months.
Jim,
Why the reference to David Slutzky? This is in the Scottsville District, right? As a resident of the south side of town, I’d appreciate some more (and higher-end) retail down this way. All the better to keep me (and the thousands who have moved into Jefferson Ridge, Eagles’ Landing, and Sterling University Apts. off of Route 29!
The reference to David Slutzky is due to the fact that he brings a different perspective to the table than has been represented on the BoS for some time. I just think that a fresh opinion may help shape the discussion between the County and the Developers in a healthy way. How, I am not yet sure, but he will probably have some input I would imagine.
The range of how many units is dependent on whether or not the site is rezoned to Neighborhood Model. 900 units can be built by right, but the Neighborhood Model would allow as many as 5,000. Waldo was being cautious.
I hope everyone is really excited about the county tax hike that we’re going to be handed for this. What the hell is the BoS thinking? Why do they apparantly hate their tax payers?
How do they expect to pay for the infrastructure for another 900- 5,000 homes? If only 3,000 homes are built and half of those people have children and on average they have 2.5 kids then we’re looking at around 3,700 new kids entering Albemarle County schools. Do we have the capacity for this? No. Think about the tens of millions of dollars that are going to be spent on school construction alone. Think about the addition law enforcement needs, the eventual need for another fire station and on and on. Can you have 5,000 homes in that small an area that all use well and septic? No way. So they’ll come asking for municipal water and sewer. You and I are going to be paying hundreds of millions of dollars for amenities that we in other areas of the county will never benefit from. Driving ourselves into debt for the sake of wealthy strangers who don’t even live here yet. All of this infrastrucure is going to cost a fortune and it’s going to be needed within just a few years. It will be decades before tax revenue from the new homes can even begin to cover the expenses that a development of this size will cost us.
I’d like to thank Hunter Craig and the BoS for crapping all over the ordinary people of Albemarle County who have enough trouble making ends meet as it is without forcing us to subsidize a multi-millionaire’s business venture.
Please do not blame the Breeden family at Biscuit run. An estate had to be settled and it involved other branches of the family, all of whom would have had to agree to leave the land as it is. The Buscuit Run Breedens could not have legally prevented this sale.
Its too bad this property could not have been placed under a conservation easement and preserved as farmland and open space in perpetuity.
We will not be content until the entire planet looks like 29 North!
In response to Hollow Boy: This a good plan to keep the area from looking like 29N. It includes business local to the housing and there is existing highway and major road access to the site already.
This is far better than another development in Crozet or Scottsville. Near to the city, highway, and mixed development. With proper retail added to it, it could reduce Rt 29 traffic by allowing those south of Charlottesville to shop without crossing the city going north.
Hollow Boy, if you think you have a better idea how to use that or any other property than Hunter Craig, you are free to get together with any number of like-minded citizens and outbid him. Then you can put whatever easements you like on it.
Unless you mean “It’s too bad we can’t take this property from its owners without paying just compensation.” I guess that’s another proposition entirely. If that’s what you’d like to see, I can only hope you’d have the grace not to complain if the government appropriated your next three paychecks for the public good.
Jack, two responses: one, the cost of that infrastructure will be amortized over a sufficiently long period of time that it will presumably be offset by the additional tax revenue from the vastly increased value of the property after development. If you think that is untrue, you should demonstrate it – otherwise it’s probably safe to assume the BoS, who may be wrong-headed but aren’t idiots, have accounted for it.
Second, you and I only enjoy the privilege of living in the C-ville area because a previous government allowed residential development where we live. There are rational arguments for planning, containing, and in some cases limiting growth, but “I got mine – how dare anyone else try to get theirs?” is not among them.
As for me, my main concern is whether the influx of 5,000+ additional C-ville limousine liberal types to that area will threaten the wonderful Rivanna Rifle & Pistol Club which is just down the road.
I agree with Bruce. Development, per se, is not necessarily a bad thing.