Boise Real Estate Blog

St. Alphonsus Hospital has opened its new Emergency Department in Eagle.
The new emergency department is housed in St. Al’s brand-new $17 million medical facility located at State Highway 44 and Eagle Road, near the Hilton Garden Inn.
The new facility is also home to Intermountain Medical Imaging, St. Al’s Rehabilitation, and will also offer outpatient surgery starting in January.
Intermountain Eye Clinic, and  several doctors’ offices, have also opened in Eagle recently.
The Emergency Department has 14 patient rooms, will operate 24 hours/day, and is the only free-standing emergency department in the State of Idaho.
St. Al’s officials expect as many as 10,000 patients will visit the new facility in its first year.
Not to be outdone, St. Luke’s Hospital is building its new Eagle facility on State Street near Old Horseshoe Bend Road; scheduled to open in 2008.

With as many as 20,000 more homes planned for the Eagle foothills, the Meridian School District is projecting a need for 10-17 new schools to serve those new residents.
Eagle’s 35-year plan, now under review by the Eagle Planning & Zoning Commission, envisions as many as 20,000 new homes on 49,000 acres lying north of downtown Eagle, and between Hwy 55 and Hwy 16.
The projected cost of the new schools ranges from $190.7 million to $317.8 million.
The cost of those schools would be born by taxpayers, if they approved the bonds necessary for construction of the schools.
Idaho school bonds require a two-thirds super majority in order to pass, and it is unknown how Meridian School District voters would react to increasing their property taxes to fund the new schools.
The estimated need for the new schools was derived by using a school district formula that includes census data, estimated students per household, and school capacity.
One possible solution to the problem of growth outrunning infrastructure would be for the City of Eagle to pass an ordinance requiring that adequate essential infrastructure be built before , or concurrent with, new development.
Sounds like a pretty good idea to me.

The Eagle, Idaho real estate scene is at the forefront of massive, life-changing growth.
Two governmental plans for growth in the foothills lying north of Eagle have been developed ~ one by Ada County; the other by the City of Eagle.
The plans project 12,000 to 20,000 more homes to be built in the area lying north of downtown Eagle, and between Highway 16 and Highway 55.
I have driven through that area and it is presently a bucolic foothills scene consisting of herds of sheep and the occasional horseback rider.
Such growth will alter the character of these lands to an extent that is nearly unimaginable.
Think of it this way ~ those rolling hills will have expensive homes on them and the roads serving those areas will have to include wide, sweeping parkways with landscaped medians, linked to 4-lane roads to get the new populace in and out of those now-undeveloped areas.
Hopefully, planners will be creative with their designs and think far enough ahead to incorporate zoning for office professional centers to house employers who will provide local jobs.
And, also include ample, carefully-considered local retail zoning to reduce car trips to existsing shopping facilities.
A preliminary analysis has already anticipated the following road improvements in the area:

• Widening Linder Road to 5 lanes.
• Widening Highway 55 south of Beacon Light Road to 6 lanes.
• Widening Hiwghway 44 (State Street) east of Ballantyne Road to 4 or 5 lanes.
• Widening Hwy 16 to 4 lanes.
• Widening Beacon Light Road, east of Linder Road, to 4 or 5 lanes.

I live in Brookwood, near the intersection of Eagle Road and Floating Feather, and already have difficulty navigating Eagle Road between Floating Feather Road and downtown Eagle at certain times of the day.  I sometimes sit through several light changes just to travel one mile on that outdated two-lane stretch of road.
I wonder what could happen to that stretch of Eagle Road ~ would it get widened?  If so, what would happen to the homes on that road, the existing elementary school, downtown Eagle, etc.?
It is interesting to remember that our land here was farm land not too long ago, and it was originally laid out in sections.  A section of land is one mile square, containing 640 acres.  Thus, our major arterial roads were built on those section lines, meaning that our major roads are usually on one-mile grids.
That makes for a logical, easily-understood North-South and East-West road system, but our local highway agency (Ada County Highway District) hasn’t been able to keep up with our recent spurt of growth and lacks the funding to make badly-needed improvements.
At present, we don’t even have turn lanes to facilitate right turns onto most of our major arterials.
One thing is certain ~ Eagle has been discovered as a terrific place to live.
When I arrived here in 2000, Eagle’s population was around 9,000; today, it is over 20,000.
If another 20,000 homes are built here in the next decade or two, we could quadruple our population to 80,000 people.
A recent study by COMPASS (Community Planning Association of Southwest Idaho) projected the following impacts on road traffic:

• Highway 55 north of Floating Feather ~ 11,174 car trips/day now vs. 74,200 projected for 2030.
• Highway 16 at Highway 44 ~ 9,100 car trips/day now vs. 55,900 projected for 2030.
• Eagle Road at the Boise River Bridge ~ 39,155 car trips/day now vs. 50,000 projected for 2030.

By now, you are probably wondering if you just found your first “no growth” Realtor^®, aren’t you?
Well, if there’s one thing I have learned from my 35 years of real estate experience, it is that it’s pointless to try and stop people from moving to a desirable area.
They’re gonna come, regardless of the obstacles the no-growthers create.
Eagle is going to grow and it up to all of us who are already here to make sure that we manage our impending growth and PLAN for it!

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.

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.