Steamboat Pilot & Today

A plan to develop 111 new building lots that would create as many as 202 new residences in Stagecoach is scheduled to come before the Routt County Board of Commissioners at 2 p.m. today.

The new Neighborhoods at Young's Peak subdivision would be built on 93 acres adjoining Routt County roads 16 and 212 south of Stagecoach Reservoir State Park and southeast of Oak Creek. The developer is Brian T. Stahl.

The property is part of the original Meadowgreen development approved for high-density residential development in 1972, along with the now defunct Stagecoach Ski Area. Stahl's proposal would down zone the land for less density.

A land-use planner working on the project will tell the county commissioners that 11 single-family homes have gone under construction in the first four months of 2005. They are part of a trend that has seen 91-single-family homes built in Stagecoach in the five years since the Stagecoach Community Plan was adopted in 1999.

The developer's proposal for the Neighborhoods at Young's Creek calls for extensive guidelines to ensure homes built within three distinct neighborhoods in the project would be of relatively high quality while remaining more affordable than much of the housing in Steamboat Springs.

"They've gone over and above what we typically see for design standards," County Planner Mary Alice Page-Allen said.

A memo submitted to the county by land-use planning firm Patten Associates describes the three neighborhoods encompassed by the subdivision. They will include a mix of single-family and duplex lots. Of the total, 66 of the single-family lots could be approved for small caretaker units.

The Doublecreek neighborhood is proposed for eight single-family lots averaging in excess of 1 acre each, with the possibility to construct a caretaker unit. It is adjacent to the existing Coyote Run subdivision.

Young's Peak neighborhood is the largest in the development. It is north of Coyote Run, south of the Eagle's Nest townhomes and west of Wagon Wheel condominiums. It would contain 65 single-family and nine duplex lots averaging 0.43 acres in size. Caretaker units would be allowed on 49 of the single-family lots.

Blacktail Meadows is the farthest north and easterly of the neighborhoods. It would contain 16 duplex and 13 single-family lots averaging more than a half-acre in size.

The developers are proposing natural open space and a trail paralleling a year-round creek that runs through the site.

The Patten memo indicates that Stahl intends to develop the subdivision and associated infrastructure during a period of years. The first phase would include the eastern portion of the Young's Peak neighborhood.

The succeeding phases would include the balance of Young's Peak and Blacktail Meadows and finally, the Doublecreek neighborhood.

Stagecoach also recently has seen proposals for a fire station in the northeast corner of Meadowgreen, a small retail commercial center and other residential subdivisions. County planners and the South Routt School district have discussed the advisability of setting aside a school site.