The entrance to
Amelia Park screams half-built subdivision, bright flags flapping on
both sides of a fresh-paved access road that is darker than the main
road and connected to it with a bump. Getting there would not be
easy without a car.
Inside, however, the south Fernandina Beach neighborhood is a
throwback to another time. Houses sit tight against sidewalks and
cheek by jowl with their neighbors. There are public parks but no
private yards; service alleys run between the gridded streets; and,
when the 115-acre community is complete, every home will be within a
five-minute walk of the grocery store.
The development seeks to woo Americans who yearn for old-time
community with a neighborhood built on an old-time scale, said J.P.
McClellan, the project manager. Those who live there say it is
working.
"I lived in an Atlanta subdivision for 18 years and I didn't know
but a handful of my neighbors; I've lived here for six weeks and I
already know more people," said John Harris, who bought a town home
on a park. "That's just what this type of neighborhood brings."
Throughout Florida and across America, a growing number of
neo-traditional communities are popping up on urban peripheries. The
most famous include Disney's Celebration, south of Orlando, and
Seaside, the Gulf Coast town where The Truman Show was
filmed.
Jacksonville changed its zoning code in 1997 to allow for
neo-traditional development, though no developers have taken the
opportunity as yet. A proposal currently before the Clay County
Commission would make similar changes, allowing a developer to build
the area's second neo-traditional neighborhood at the corner of
Cheswick Oaks Avenue and Spencers Plantation Boulevard.
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Resident Judi Lowery
talks to J.P. McClellan, project manager for Brylen Homes, the
Amelia Park homebuilder, from the porch of her Gardenia Street
home.
-- Bob Mack/Staff
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Proponents say
neighborhoods such as Amelia Park restore soul to suburbia by
placing people in such close proximity that interaction is
inevitable. Furthermore, as higher property values drive people
closer together, traditional neighborhoods are seen by some as a
time-tested way to comfortably fit more people into less space.
"It makes multifamily housing palatable," said Thad Crowe,
planning director for Clay County.
Neo-traditional plans, however, tend to violate existing planning
codes in numerous ways. To build Amelia Park, for example,
developers required 23 official exemptions from Fernandina Beach's
best-practice standards.
The standards, written by a generation that fled cities for
suburban life, mandated cul-de-sacs, large lots and front yards as a
defense against the deterioration of property values. Many political
leaders are reluctant to see that change.
"These [developments] are future slums," said Clay County
Commissioner Larry Lancaster, who believes developers would abuse an
ordinance change to cram more houses onto a given parcel than now is
legal.
On the flip side, some opponents say the neo-traditional
neighborhoods will never serve more than an upscale niche.
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Amelia Park resident
Judi Lowery talks about her home while while a new home is
being constructed on the lot next door. Clay County is
considering a development similar to Amelia Park in the near
future.
-- Bob Mack/Staff
|
Amenities such as
land for alleys and parks can add 20 percent to the cost of a home
in a neo-traditional neighborhood, said Bob Porter, a senior manager
at development giant Centex Homes. That forces buyers to place a
premium on the value of community, and thus far has limited the
concept's mass appeal, he said.
Elsewhere in Florida, several development groups have set out to
build thousand-home traditional neighborhood projects. Locations
include the outskirts of Tallahassee and Orlando and Jupiter on the
Atlantic coast.
In Jacksonville, however, the trend has yet to catch. Amelia
Park, the only neo-traditional neighborhood in the area, will
include about 400 homes. The proposed development in Clay County
would include no more than 225.
The residents of Amelia Park have experienced some of the
problems predicted by critics of neo-traditional development. For
example, if cul-de-sacs discourage contact with neighbors, gridded
streets encourage contact with strangers.
"The [pizza] delivery boy is particularly bad," said Karelyn
Lotz, an Amelia Park resident who says the neighborhood is often
used as a cut-through because of its multiple entrances.
On the whole, however, they are thrilled with their neighborhood
and their neighbors.
Moving to Amelia Park was a lifestyle choice, said Judi Lowery,
who just celebrated one year of residence in a fairly small home
with a big front porch.
"No matter where we go, we easily make friends," she said. "But
we wanted a neighborhood where you can come down the street and it
looks very appealing."
There are also ways in which neo-traditional neighborhoods and
typical suburban development have drawn closer to each other and
further from their respective sources, Victorian town centers like
historic Fernandina and 1950s subdivisions like those that line
Blanding Boulevard.
The Amelia Park retail district, a central feature of
neo-traditional development, is slated for groundbreaking in the
near future. It will sit at the edge of the community, within
walking distance of the homes but also on a prominent thoroughfare.
Also, while the community largely is composed of empty nesters,
the number of families could rise if a planned school is built on
the edge of the community. That is a common feature of planned
communities such as Julington Creek Plantation or Eagle Harbor.
Less common is the fact that McClellan is building his own home
at Amelia Park. The developer, Joel Embry, is building one
alongside.
McClellan's home will be covered in a revolutionary kind of
concrete shingles that can be hammered into place without
shattering. It is designed to look as if it has been lived in for a
hundred years.
Staff writer Binyamin Appelbaum can be reached at (904)
278-9431 or at bappelbaum.
