If you have been following numerous emails and website posts about the impending housing developments along Quail Gardens Drive then you should be interested in the following update. To recap, over 1300 housing units are planned to be built within the next few years along Quail Gardens Drive and Saxony Road. This will without any doubt have a significant impact on traffic, safety, quality of life and liability.
One of those developments is still in the planning phase and was recently brought to the city Planning Commission and that is the Baldwin & Sons development called Quail Meadows which will have 485 units with five floors (two underground). This is going to be built right next to the Sunshine Gardens Apartments that is already under construction at the corner of Encinitas Blvd. and Quail Gardens Drive.
On November 1st the Sanderling Waldorf site, on Mays Hollow Lane (next to the Jehovah’s Witnesses church) was sold, and so no Sanderling Waldorf school or other school or high density project will be built on Mays Hollow Lane! The new owner(s) reported that they plan to renovate the existing house on the site and that the other lots will be divided and prepared for 3 or 4 houses total, with respect of the rules regarding R-3 zoning, natural resources, wetland and required buffer area protecting nature and sensitive species.
This long road, from 2016 till now, ended so positively for nature, traffic and neighborhood for the biggest part thanks to Hamilton Biologic Inc. who assisted in this process with his extensive and penetrating knowledge of biological resources and law in this field.
Now there is a next challenge, as most of you know: the very high density project on Quail Meadows, along Quail Gardens Drive, adjacent to the previous Sanderling site, and North of the Sunshine Gardens site, with 485 housing units planned, with elevation of the existing grade, and (4) 3 story-high buildings.
This site has, as you can imagine, the same issues regarding nature as the adjacent (previous) Sanderling site; it has sensitive habitat, (breeding) gnatcatchers reported over the past years, and its own wetland area as well. There is a strong belief that nature needs to be protected according to the Coastal Law and LCP, and this project DOES need a Coastal Development Permit! (even though it is a “by-right” project not having to follow CEQA regulations).
Therefore, for the same reasons as with Sanderling, Hamilton Biological has been hired to help fight according to Coastal Law, this proposed plan of Quail Meadows with too many housing units, impacting native nature, sensitive species, Encinitas character as well as traffic issues that the high number of units would give. Hamilton Biological is a biological consulting firm located in Long Beach specializing in plant and wildlife surveys including endangered species surveys.
The financing of the Hamilton Biological expertise was done solely by the residents of Mays Hollow. As this is a bigger project, we would like to ask to help support this effort by donating a contribution towards the work and time of Hamilton Biological Inc.
If so, you can donate to the following Venmo account: @Carmen-Nespor. You will need Carmen’s phone number which is 760-783-8203.
The City Planning Commission Hearing on this project took place on October 20th, and it was decided “to be continued” this coming up Thursday November 3rd. The first meeting was attended by a number of members of the Four Corners Consortium advocating for traffic mitigation along Quail Gardens Drive and Saxony Road. Also any letter or public speaking on this matter is beneficial.
