photo credit: courtesy Pacific Development
Conceptual design for housing on Guerneville Road at Lance Drive in Santa Rosa.

Hundreds of families could find homes on what's now a 34-acre vacant field along Guerneville Road in Santa Rosa. That's as another major housing development was recently unveiled.

Conceptual plans call for 672 apartments spread among 25 three-story buildings, along with 100 single family homes and commercial space.

The site sits at the intersection of Guerneville Road and Lance Drive, in close proximity to Comstock Middle School, and Northwest Community Park and near both the North Santa Rosa SMART stop and the Coddingtown mall.

Though no action was taken when the designs were shown to Santa Rosa's Design Review Board, commissioners had a number of suggestions--have buildings facing the street, consider things like a community garden rather than a demonstration garden and add more color to structures.

Neighbors also weighed in, most positively, but with some hesitancy. Additional traffic, parking issues, wildfire evacuation, water and crime were all mentioned.

Tom Robertson, also a residential builder, told the committee that infill development is essentially a tradeoff if sprawl is to be avoided, and why voters created a greenline decades ago.

"Part of that bargain was that this kind of development, within the city limits, would be permitted and we need housing desperately in Santa Rosa," Robertson said.

Resident Duane DeWitt challenged officials to shape a project that will help Santa Rosa fulfill its aspirations as less auto dependent, but Teresa Altesio expressed doubts that such a transition will ever come to pass.

"I would love to see that people with bikes can go down the roads and be able to ride everywhere, but, now it's like you are taking your life in your own hands because the roads and the way people drive through there," Altesio said.

The project, due to its location, is using an expedited approval process, but it seems unlikely that anything will sail through. Neighbor Paula Souffle threw down the gauntlet.

"Adding new streets to dump on to Guerneville Road makes no sense," Souffle said. "We have other concerns and we will be bringing CEQA, we will be bringing other homeowners associations and we have retained counsel. We will fight this project on every particular item."