Why Pine's New Emerald Fields Neighborhood Will Connect with Woodland Farms—But Not Woodside Estates

Pine Township officials are explaining how a "relaxed" cul-de-sac law allowed them to circumvent a requirement to connect the already-established Woodside Estate neighborhood to the new Emerald Fields housing development—but not the Woodland Farms plan of homes.

“As soon as we saw the Woodside Estates had 26 homes and only 1,825 feet of road, we knew immediately this might be an opportunity to help these folks,” Supervisor Ted Owen said Monday.

Emerald Fields a Go

At the March 18 Pine Board of Supervisors meeting, Pine officials gave tentative approval for Emerald Fields, a new housing plan to be located on 276 acres along Mt. Pleasant Road.

Developer Pat Minnock of Pine Development Company said he plans to build 198 upscale single-family homes in five phases on the property, a former farm with frontage along Mt. Pleasant, Dean and Franklin roads that has been in his family for 30 years.

With the board’s tentative approval, the developer must file for final approval for each phase of the housing plan.

Originally, the development also included street connections to the neighboring Woodland Farms and Woodland Estates housing plans. Owen said a long-standing law requires interconnections between the neighborhoods for good planning practices—and for public safety reasons.

Currently, the only way to enter and exit the Woodland Fields neighborhood—which eventually ends in a culdesac—is through Pinkerton Road. Once the neighborhood is connected to Emerald Fields, motorists will have a second access point at the far end of Pinkerton Road.

Similarly, The Emerald Fields development would create another entrance and exit point for The Woodside Estates neighborhood, which also ends in a culdesac.

The Northern Regional police department, the Wexford Volunteer Fire Company and the Pine-Richland School District also have given their support to the interconnections with the new neighborhood, officials said.

In anticipation of a link to a future neighborhood, a “stub” road called Blueberry Trail already exists off Macintosh Road in the Woodside Estates neighborhood.

The road, which has no homes on it, is marked by a sign explaining the right-of-way may be extended in the future to other housing developments and roadways. A similar plan is in place for the Woodland Estates neighborhood, Owens said.

“They knew for decades they would one day be required to connect to the adjoining property if it were ever to be developed,” he said of residents in the neighborhoods.  

But that doesn’t mean all were happy about it.

The Cul-De-Sac Qualification

At prior Pine Township meetings, a number of residents from both neighborhoods expressed public safety concerns, including fear the new Emerald Fields development would increase traffic, and speeding, in the area.

While the size of the Woodland Farms neighborhood requires an interconnection between it and the Emerald Fields development, the Woodside Estates neighborhood was small enough to fall under the township’s "relaxed" cul-de-sac law.

Owen said the township’s cul-de-sac law was amended three years ago in response to a public desire for more cul-de-sacs and fewer interconnects in the community.

To qualify as a cul-de-sac, a neighborhood must have fewer than 50 homes and less than 4,000 feet of roadway, assistant township manager Scott Anderson said.

With only 26 homes and just under 2,000 feet of roadway, Macintosh Road in the Woodland Estate neighborhood easily fit the cul-de-sac requirements, Owen said. He added officials also believe access to the smaller Macintosh Road neighborhood, which is located off Franklin Road, already adequately meets public safety requirements.

“Had public safety concerns in favor of interconnection outweighed public desire for cul-de-sac, the interconnect would have been ordered,” Owens said in an email.

Despite outcry from some Pinkerton Road residents, the interconnections were required for Woodland Farms, which is too large to qualify as a cul-de-sac.

“The basic simple answer for Pinkerton Road is there was nothing supervisors could do,” Owen said. “The law requires it and it basically has to improve.”

The Future

Owen said he believes many Woodland Farms residents eventually will be pleased with the interconnection to Emerald Fields because it gives them another access point to the township’s main thoroughfares without having to travel the length of Pinkerton Road, which features a hill and a sharp turn near the neighborhood’s entrance.

“In the winter, that road is awful and that’s currently the only way out,” Owen said.

Project engineer John Schleicher of Gibson Thomas Engineering Co. Inc. said construction on the first two phases of Emerald Fields, which will consist of 68 homes, could begin by summer.

Construction on all five phases of the neighborhood is expected to conclude by the end of 2016.    

Plans for the new neighborhood also include two recreation areas, pedestrian trails and sidewalks. About 120 acres of the property will be dedicated as open space.

Do you live in Woodland Farms or Woodside Estates? What are your thoughts on the Emerald Fields development? Tell us in the comment section below. 

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