[quote=AN]carli, so, what you’re saying is, One Paseo is too dense. But yet, you also say there’s no public transit. You also say it’s impossible to stop the development and all of Carmel Valley are zoned to be not very dense. Which mean that you don’t mind that Carmel Valley will forever be a lower density area with no public transit, since there’s not enough density for a need for public transit. Am I understanding that correctly?[/quote]
AN –
Yes to your first two statements, which means yes, I’m saying One Paseo is too dense and yes, I’m saying there is NO public transit.
No to your third statement, as I don’t think I ever said “it’s impossible to stop the development” but what I did say is that there are already developments in the pipeline that should not/could not be stopped.
And no to your fourth statement “…you don’t mind that Carmel Valley will forever be a lower density area with no public transit…” If that’s how you understood what I was stating, I’ll clarify this is not what I meant to express. I do not want Carmel Valley to be solely made up of low density housing, nor do I want it to stay free of public transit. The opposite is true.
I think we differ in terms of the priority we place on things like aesthetics, quality of life (including hassle factors like traffic), environmental impacts, etc, or maybe we just have different needs.
Either way, I believe residents of a city should have a chance to weigh in on both the community planning process as well as major deviations from the plan, such as this one. As you said, it’s too bad we can’t send this One Paseo proposal to a vote.
As someone else mentioned, of course community plans become outdated quickly so let’s figure out a way to respond quicker to the changes in our community. But swinging the pendulum all the way to the other side and throwing out the plan to say yes to any developer’s proposal (the denser, the better) just because we need more housing is not the right answer. There is some common ground in between.
And a free market approach may sound attractive in theory, but I believe most people want a voice in how their surroundings evolve, especially when a considerable part of their income and/or net worth is probably tied up in it. Who among us is willing to say about our neighborhood, “Let the developers build what they want and the market will figure out if it’s the right thing”? No thank you.
