Issues abound with potential development
A developer team, including Jack Eure, the principal, and Will Conley, our own, gave a presentation at the Community Center last week. They plan to develop 54 acres at 1492 and RR 12--calling it Tierra de Piedra. In their introduction, I was warmed by their use of “conservation,” “sustainable,” “nature preserve,” “needs of the community,” and “dark skies.” By the end, I was chilled to the bone by their violation of them all.
I live near that tract of land and have walked it with the permission of the former owner.
The land is steep and fragile. The proposed two lane road from the northwest corner at 1492 rises 140 feet, much of it plowing through the trees straight up the hill, to get to a pair of level outcroppings at the east edge where they plan to build 44 homes, 20 apartments, and other buildings some 20-40 feet or so from one other. Jack and Will said that this many residential and utility buildings (plus a retail center on the highway) are necessary to amortize the 27 or so acres to be placed in conservation easement as a nature preserve (a wildlife exemption on the tax roles). The homes will sell from $220,000 to $2,000,000.
To fit on the two narrow level terraces, the buildings must be tall and multi-story. All the buildings sketched have at least two flights of stairs. Cars are parked underneath half of them. I suggested to Jack that such an arrangement might be impractical for people moving into smaller spaces in retirement. He said elevators had gotten inexpensive.
The retail center on RR12 is to be an art/craft/coffee house type of place. Whatever type of place it might turn out to be, it would be 37,000 square feet of retail floor space just south of Plaza del Sol. The retail section appears on the site plan to be too close to RR12 to fulfill the set-back and other imperatives of the Wimberley Entry Corridor Overlay District: standards designed to present a soft view and pleasing drive into the center of town.
A designated flood plain wraps around the lower corner of the tract.
This land is a major contributor to a branch that enters Pierce Creek in this flood plain. Pierce Creek has run into the buildings of Plaza del Sol at least twice since we’ve lived her, and several times it has crossed 12 in a deep dangerous rush. I believe the presenters said that the proposed development has 27% impervious cover. I note that there are a couple of acres up by the buildings designated as horse pasture. Having been raised with horses, having seen what they do in confined hill country spaces, and knowing this eroded and compacted ground, I wonder if that “pasture” is correctly included as impervious.
Calling that lot a pasture is one of the telling bits of evidence that the developers do not know this land well. Another: one of the benefits listed for the development was “food security.” I garden across the valley from this tract. Given enough hauled-in soil and lots of water, one can bring a few tomatoes to the table. They propose 50-60 tables with 2-4 people at each one. Every rate payer of Wimberley Water Supply best look up.
Speaking of hauled-in topsoil, the sewage from these 150 or so people is to be treated and dispersed in the conservation easement/nature preserve. Because there is not enough topsoil there to fill a short bed pickup, soil will have to be hauled in to absorb the wastewater. The land must be cut and graded, retaining walls built, and nature mauled and unpreserved to create the waste water field. I don’t know how many truck loads of soil would have to be stripped off of someplace and brought in for this purpose, but this does not fit my definition of sustainable or preservation.
Just below this planned injection of treated wastewater there are a spring and a waterfall that flow clean and clear after a rain.
Gary Weeks