New Hempfield [PA] development emphasizes density, walkability, sustainability

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ^ | 08 August 2005 | Caitlin Cleary

[Lorianne]

Out in the undulating green farmland of Westmoreland County, Route 819 and Forbes Trail Road form a lonely crossroads in Hempfield.

This rural junction is watched over by a few faded barns, and is easily missed in a blink through the windshields of speeding motorists.

But if developers have their way, this piece of great wide open space soon will be the seed of a new community, the main street of a 700-acre "traditional neighborhood development" called Northpointe. The intersecting streets would be lined with up to one million square feet of retail stores, galleries, office space and restaurants topped with loft apartments.

Just beyond this central business district, developers plan to create a densely organized and pedestrian-friendly "town" featuring up to 2,000 single-family homes, townhouses, apartments, carriage homes and larger estates, said Mike Rosen, a Philadelphia architect hired by the developers, the Glasser family of Hempfield.

Homes will range in price from below $200,000 to more than $1 million. The community would most likely have its own fire station, post office, school and medical facility.

An existing housing development, also called Northpointe, located off Forbes Trail Road, would be part of the overall project.

Last week, Hempfield planners gave preliminary approval to the Glassers' conceptual plan, allowing engineering work on the project to go forward. The project would take eight to 10 years to complete.

Northpointe is designed to be a traditional neighborhood development, or TND, meeting the principles of New Urbanism, a "smart growth" planning philosophy that emphasizes density, walkability and sustainability. In a TND, the architecture is human-scale -- no big-box stores or ocean-sized parking lots. Sidewalks promote walking. Porches and small front yards invite conversation. Tree-lined boulevards and on-street parking slow down traffic.

[Lorianne]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/images/200508/1123475710031.jpg

[NaughtiusMaximus]

This way, wealthy liberals can get away from the junkies, bums and drunks their policies have created. (We see the same thing in Flagstaff, AZ. and hear the same BS rationalizations for "rouge cell" developments.)

[sergeantdave]

Anytime I see the words "smart growth" I see the United Nations, Agenda 21, Biodivesity Treaty, and zippy-dee property rights.

Hope the serfs living there like their little slice of feudalism, lorded over by unelected soviet bureaucratic councils.

[Kay Ludlow]

You've got that right!

I don't really mind if a developer wants to do something like this and has determined there is a market for it. What I do mind is that the local municipal governments, and their state mandated planning departments in PA are starting to require these kinds of things if you want to develop land. The article complains about developments with 1/2 acre lots and lots of cul-de-sacs? That's what our planners were requiring - to reduce density and slow traffic. The whole idea of a planned community is just so soviet...