Gold Hill Mesa grading work prepares site for Filings 4 & 5
In a recent wide-angle view from 21st Street, graders
shape the terrain at Gold Hill Mesa north of Lower Gold Camp Road (not visible
at right). The area at the top of the slope, level with
Lower Gold Camp, will have houses built on it along an extension of Eclipse
Drive to 21st. In the background at left can be seen the gradual slope that will
bring
Eclipse Drive up from Portland Gold Drive. The small figures along the face of
the near slope are a man walking a dog.
Westside Pioneer photo
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Forty-one lots are shown for that 5.2-acre area in a submittal to City Land Use Review for Filing 4 in Gold Hill's Phase 1 development plan.
Filing 5, to be submitted at a later date, will abut 21st Street and have eight more lots, plans show.
Construction on Filing 4 can begin with city approval. Rick O'Connor, the planner assigned to the project, said that he is waiting on some “pretty minor” revisions to the plans and that he can approve the submittal administratively.
The request is to allow a final plat on the 41 lots in Filing 4 and for an amendment to the Gold Hill Mesa Phase 1 Development Plan.
 The area earmarked for amendment in Gold Hill Mesa's Phase 1 Development Plan is surrounded by a squiggly line, overwritten with yellow marker. Within that area, Eclipse Drive's planned connection with Portland Gold Drive can be seen at upper right. North is up. Lower Gold Camp Road (the southern boundary of Gold Hill Mesa) goes east to west at the bottom of the drawing, with 21st Street at far left. The short street in the lower middle of the graphic, connecting to Lower Gold Camp now (and in the future to Eclipse) is Merrimac Street. Note: Nearly all the streets in Gold Hill Mesa are named after former Cripple Creek mines. Courtesy of Gold Hill Mesa and City
Land Use Review
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With close to 200 households now, Gold Hill Mesa is a residential/ commercial development on 210 acres north of Lower Gold Camp, east of 21st Street and south of Highway 24. Located on the west side of the property, Phase 1 takes up a little less than half of the total acreage. The project's development plan was last amended in 2012.
When Gold Hill Mesa first broke ground about a decade ago, there was only a small amount of land east of 21st at the same grade as Lower Gold Camp Road above a dropoff. Over the years, developers have hauled dirt from other parts of the property to expand that at-grade portion. In the recent grading work alone, heavy equipment moved “roughly 35,000 cubic yards from Filing 4 into Filing 5," according to Gold Hill property manager Barry Brinton.
In addition to allowing more buildable lots, the work will let Eclipse Drive go up from Portland Gold Drive (previously built at the base of the slope) in a gradual manner as part of Filing 4, Brinton explained.
In Filing 5, the Phase 1 plan shows Eclipse being extended farther west, to 21st Street, with lots along its north side.
Brinton said that the development partners who own Gold Hill Mesa are still determining the Filing 5 lot layout.
Also undecided at this point is the kind of intersection Eclipse should have at 21st, where it is tentatively set to line up with Skyview Lane. Skyview currently deadends on the opposite side of 21st.
“I don't think it would be signalized due to the proximity to Lower Gold Camp Road [crossing 21st Street a few hundred feet to the south], but this is a decision by Traffic Engineering,” O'Connor said.
The grading in that part of Gold Hill Mesa has also created a large, flat space of about 2 acres at the northeast corner of 21st Street and Gold Camp Road, just south of the future Eclipse Drive but separate from Phase 1. Over the years, the partners who own Gold Hill Mesa have discussed commercial as well as residential developments at that corner, but a final product decision has not been made.
As for the northwest corner of that intersection, also vacant, those 1 ½ acres are owned in two properties by Donald Pinello, who has not submitted any plans there to date.
Westside Pioneer article
(Posted 7/15/14;
Land:
Development Proposals)
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