Open Spaces Valued

So says this article from yesterday's AZ Republic:

Darin Adams enjoys playing golf when time permits. But when it came to deciding where to buy a new house, being near a golf course was the least of his worries.

With a 4-year-old daughter, Darin and his wife, Heather, were much more interested in a subdivision's parks and trail system.

This article frames the question as one of a golf course home versus a non-golf course home, but I found their conclusions interesting from the point of view of a Morrison Ranch resident:

"I would love to live on a golf course for sure, but my mentality right now is that's where I see myself in retirement, not raising a family," Darin said. "Right now, we get much more use having a park nearby."

The Adamses are part of a larger trend of new homebuyers who favor parks and trails as their most desired community amenity, contrasting with previous notions that living on or near a golf course represented the epitome of American lifestyles.

The desire for open space is not a new trend, but it's certainly one home builders have had to respond to.

As it is patently obvious, Morrison Ranch also places a high premium on open space. One of the aesthetic pleasures of farming is gazing at a green field, planted by the sweat of one's brow, framed by the mountain vistas. No farmer I know ever said to himself, "By golly, this view is getting boring; I think I'll fill it up with houses!" And on a more painful note, we've heard plenty of neighbors exclaim, "Wait! You can't take away my views of the fields and mountains!" The realities of booming growth in Gilbert demanded some lifestyle changes, but we have worked hard to keep the view corridors green, the spaces open, the feel neighborly. I talk about this a lot; in fact, I talked about it in an earlier post (the older I get, the more I repeat myself, it seems), which you can read here, but I'll quote myself:

One of the themes repeated in the rhetorical war against sprawl is the loss of open space. If we keep growing, we will lose the desert vistas, I hear. Or, on a more personal level, some of our neighbors didn't want to lose the views of the mountains over the alfalfa fields (neither did we, but I've posted about that before). And on the most personal level, the Mister grew up in a house on a field, with seemingly unlimited open space, and he wasn't sure he wanted to live in a "housing development packed cheek to jowl" (now there's a phrase from the past). So what is open space?

The town of Gilbert requires 10% open space in residential developments; this refers to parks, trails, playgrounds, and such. Most developments end up at about 15%. Morrison Ranch is at 22%. This includes the parks, trails, green belts, and playgrounds. This does not include the parkways or the common area lining the streets, which adds more green to the eye, and eventually will provide more shade (do the trees decrease the open space, or enhance it?).

A buzzword in our office is view corridors; that is, what do you see when you look from this or that direction? A view of the grain silos or the lake is a premier view, but that's not possible from every spot. What is possible is to keep the views open, or at least ending in green rather than walls. When you look down a street, usually the ending view will be a park of some sort, or at least a line of trees. The goal is to promote the open space that we have, and to soften the ends of streets with lush foliage instead of hammering the eyes with concrete walls, or even houses. When you take your next walk through Morrison Ranch, check out the view corridors, and you'll see what I mean.

One last look at the AZ Republic article highlights the sidebar:

Home buyers have been telling builders that they prefer parks and paths to golf courses. Other amenities they prefer are:
• Mixed-use areas. Trails in larger communities, walking/jogging trails, play/recreation areas.
• Cluster of convenience stores.
• Communal open spaces and wide open spaces.
• Community club facility.
• More neo-urbanism, neo-traditional communities that create opportunities to meet neighbors, including front porches, gathering areas, or tree-lined winding streets.
Source: National Association of Homebuilders

Other than the fact that our tree-lined streets are straight (reminiscent of crop rows or orchards), I'd say Morrison Ranch does a pretty good job of meeting these desires.