 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
Home Resource Center In the News Home Greenbelt Alliance in the News |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
|
Greenbelt Alliance In the News
April 5, 2008 Pittsburg Hills decision Your Turn Guest commentary Dennis and Kathleen Linsley, Friends of Pittsburg/Save Our Hills One major difference between Southern California and the Bay Area is that here, the hills have not been paved over with housing. Over the past 25 years, area cities implemented laws that limit development of their hillsides, all in the firm conviction that hills are important amenities to the quality of life in their cities. Unfortunately, that foresight seems to have run out before reaching the Pittsburg Planning Commission. For more than a year, Friends of Pittsburg/Save Our Hills along with Greenbelt Alliance, Sierra Club, Save Mount Diablo and the Concord Naval Weapons Station Neighborhood Alliance, and ACORN have been trying to work with Pittsburg's elected officials to protect the city's southern ridge lines. Pittsburg residents have spent their evenings at Planning Commission hearings, asking elected officials to protect the hills. But in a remarkable display of indifference, the Planning Commission paid no attention. (With one exception: they do listen closely to developer Albert Seeno III, who stands to profit handsomely from paving the hills.) Now the Planning Commission has created a hillside ordinance that does exactly the opposite of what it should do. Rather than protecting the hills, it is geared to maximize development. It will allow massive subdivisions of more than 3,000 houses to be built on scenic ridge-lines and steep slopes. Worst of all, it will allow unrestricted grading— that is, flattening the hills entirely. Pittsburg residents have already had to deal with the consequences of poorly planned growth that stretched local infrastructure too thin. The impacts will go well beyond Pittsburg. This development will mean an additional 13,000 car trips per day, which will affect roads and air quality all over Contra Costa County, not just in Pittsburg. Many people are unaware that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Pittsburg has already approved 4,729 housing units that have yet to be built. We haven't even seen the impacts of that yet, and now the city wants to add 3,000 more. That makes no sense at all. There is no need to build on the hills. Pittsburg's downtown is a historic neighborhood that could be revitalized with new homes and businesses. The planned eBART station also will be a prime location for new homes close to transit and services. Pittsburg's leaders have one last chance to wake up. Instead of running the city from the Country Town Waffle Restaurant, the City Council needs to listen to calls from its residents to protect Pittsburg's hills. On Monday, the City Council can knock some sense into the process by rejecting the Planning Commission's proposal, and instead pass an ordinance that does what it should: keeps development off ridge lines and hilltops, and prevents ugly, dangerous grading. If the council decides to ignore us, you can be assured we will continue to fight to protect the beauty of the hills by opposing the annexation of these hillsides and fight developer agreements that Seeno will use to lock in development. We ask anyone who cares about the future of their community to join us at Monday's hearing. ### |
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
