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| The Hidden Oaks housing development site in Carbon Canyon, proposed for 107 luxury custom home lots. |
The first concern has to do with the city staff’s request for clustering,
ostensibly intended to protect more ridgelines and natural features within the
project site. Unfortunately, while clustering may work very well in
certain types of developments and environments, it is entirely another matter
with Hidden Oaks. A review of the maps presented at last month’s scoping
meeting indicate that the clusters actually serve to divide up “open space”
(put in brackets because it is unclear how much natural vs. manufactured open
space there will actually be] that limits the effectiveness of the clustering
arrangement. This is particularly so in regards to animal movement as
well as general aesthetics for the Carbon Canyon area, such as visibility from
nearby areas including Chino Hills State Park and the clustering of high
concentrations of artificial ambient light.
Clustering, in this project, also
serves to further complicate emergency evacuations in case of fire, which is a
serious risk to this property, having been burned several times in recent
decades, most notably in November 2008. This is especially so considering the
one main route in and out of the proposed development and what appears to be a
significantly under-considered emergency access road out through the Vellano
community, given existing local fire department standards for such roads.
The alternative emergency access road not only would, along with an unneeded
public park added as a sweetener to the project, decimate an excellent mature
oak grove, but would only be a few hundred yards west of the main entrance and
deposit fleeing residents onto a congested Carbon Canyon Road.
Finally, in order to accommodate
the desires of the developer (rather than the concerns of the community in
which the project is located), the city, which has no legal obligation to do
so, proposes a zoning change for clustering. Chino Hills citizens in 1999
passed Measure U precisely in response to excessive zoning changes granted by
accommodating city councils to developers to the detriment of local and broader
communities and, especially, to the sensitivities of places such as Carbon
Canyon, which has unique characteristics. This property should be
developed under existing zoning, which were developed for entirely valid
reasons and which are far better for the site in terms of aesthetics, emergency
evacuation, animal movement and other aspects.
Secondly, the fire risk is greatly increased by the siting of houses along
ridge tops and hillsides leading to ridges. Ridge tops and other higher
elevation areas are not only exposed to stronger wind gusts, but the canyons
and gullies that lead to them are natural funnels for fire. Even with
so-called “fuel modification zones,” walls of flame that can reach several
dozen feet or more in heights and, importantly, embers that can travel up to a
mile, can breach these sites. Anyone conducting EIRs in areas like this,
that are actually, on the Orange County/Brea portion of the canyon, signed by
CalTrans as a “Hazardous Fire Area”, should carefully watch and review Living
With Fire, a 22-minute film released in June 2013 by the United States
Geological Survey through its Southern California Wildfire Risk Project.
This film can be downloaded online at: http://gallery.usgs.gov/videos/620.
As increasingly larger portions of our state burn from year-to-year, it is
imperative that abundant caution be utilized by local governments when
considering housing projects in wildland or wildland-adjacent areas.
With regards to air quality, while it is obvious that any large-scale housing
development project will generate particles that exceed CEQA mitigation
standards, there is always the fallback of using a Statement of Overriding
Consideration (SOC). The question for the city becomes: what form of
mitigation through an SOC will actually have any meaning for the canyon, as
opposed to what might be done more broadly within the city? It is also
relevant here to note that there are new climate change statutes that should be
considered with respect to how housing projects are planned with regard to this
and other issues, preeminently water, as well as traffic with respect to
emissions.
Concerning traffic, here is another mitigation problem. The city would
undoubtedly invoke another SOC on this point, but if the thought is that a
traffic signal at the project entrance at Carbon Canyon Road and Canyon Hills
Road constitutes a meaningful mitigation, the city would do well to
reconsider that assumption. All a signal will do is slow down the vast
majority of commuters on Carbon Canyon Road to allow Hidden Oaks residents to
turn on to what has become in the last two years, a notably more congested
state highway. It should be further noted that more idling traffic means
worse air quality for people, animals and plant life within Carbon
Canyon.
Finally, there is water. Obviously, California is in a drought of
historic proportions and mandated cuts by the state and local water agencies
are in effect. Yet, as news outlets are increasingly reporting, the
grossest users of water are those who live in larger homes on bigger lots in
exclusive communities. This is precisely the type of development embodied
by Hidden Oaks. Hopefully, the EIR will take into account the fact
that one of greatest environmental impacts of any development project during
this era of unprecedented water scarcity is the amount of water to be consumed
by luxury homes on large lots.
Hidden Oaks is exactly the kind of
project that should be avoided in this and many other contexts.
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| Another shot of the Hidden Oaks site, taken in early September. |
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