Eagle Could Add 20,000 Homes
I almost feel sheepish for bringing this up (sorry, I just couldn’t hep myself, but a recent article in The Idaho Statesman detailed plans for 20,000 more homes in the Eagle foothills.
The present residents (in photo above), obviously are not too keen about this plan.
Various developers, including M3, have submitted plans for annexation to the City of Eagle proposing as many as 20,000 new homes on the now-rural rolling foothills lying North of Eagle and between Highways 55 and 16.
As a resident of Eagle, I must say that such growth is nearly incomprehensible to me.
The plan raises many questions, chief among them congestion and traffic. If Eagle Road were to remain the main North-South connector for the new development and downtown Eagle, gridlock would be inevitable (we already have gridlock at certain times of the day!) unless Eagle Road were widened into a multi-lane expressway.
I moved to Eagle in 2001, when there were 9,500 residents and everything was pretty calm and peaceful.
Yeah, I know ~ I am in the growth business and should be thrilled with all of this new growth, right?
Well, let’s take a look at what it could mean:
We had 9,500 residents in Eagle in 2000.
We now have 20,000 residents in Eagle.
Assuming an average household size of three people, another 20,000 homes would boost our population to 80,000 people ~ four times our present population.
Can anyone spell “O-r-a-n-g-e C-o-u-n-t-y?”.
Given the fact that our local transportation wizards at Ada County Highway District can’t seem to figure out that we need turn/merge lanes on overloaded Eagle Road, we can only hope our elected officials do a better job of planning for what seems to be inevitable growth in the Eagle area.
May 21st, 2007 Posted in Uncategorized
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