-By Sarah Lavender Smith, for the Telluride Daily Planet
I’ve been called a NIMBY for opposing the Diamond Ridge housing proposal near the airport, which would be a half mile from my home, and a recent article about the controversy quoted somebody who boiled the opposition down to “a NIMBY thing.” I can’t help but speak out on this overly simplistic, divisive label that reduces a complex, difficult topic to black and white with bad guys who supposedly care only about property values.
Let’s start with the idea that many of us oppose new homes in a high-density cluster above the airport because we view it as “my backyard.” I’d view it instead as the entire region’s “backyard.” Every hiker who ascends the Deep Creek Trail appreciates the view of the undeveloped mesa. Every cyclist who traverses the dirt Last Dollar and Deep Creek roads values these unpaved backroads with minimal vehicles. It’s my hope the Diamond Ridge parcels would convert to protected public open space, with access for light recreational use, so it truly would be everyone’s extended backyard.
The NIMBY label sidesteps concerns I and others have about the process that led to the parcels’ purchase and rezoning. San Miguel County and the Town of Telluride spent more than $7 million in public money to buy the land — a de-facto commitment to the development — without first conducting impact studies and understanding what infrastructure and development costs would be.
Consider an analogous hypothetical scenario, which illustrates how the Diamond Ridge deal went down. Imagine you live in Ophir or, perhaps, near Trout Lake or on Hastings Mesa. You reasonably assume the area won’t change much because of existing land-use agreements and zoning. Then, in the middle of off-season when few are paying attention to news, you find out from an Instagram post that San Miguel County is buying a swath of nearby land to fast-track building a neighborhood there with more homes than Lawson Hill. Moreover, you learn the County created a Community Housing Zone with language that expressly empowers public officials to disregard concerns about density and incompatibility with the surrounding land. How would you feel?
By contrast, Mountain Village officials are engaging in a more transparent and deliberative process to buy 55 acres in Ilium Valley to develop between 100 and 300 deed-restricted rental and for-sale units. They’re doing due diligence before finalizing the purchase.
The Diamond Ridge parcels sat on the market for two decades because it’s bad place to build any housing for myriad reasons, including the difficulty and cost of pumping water uphill to a dry mesa, the inevitable conflict with the airport (residents would have to live with the spinning floodlight at night and the smell of jet fuel during the day), and the area’s strongest winds that create a serious fire risk (no one has explained where a new fire station or a giant tank of water for fire suppression would go).
The big question we as a community need to wrestle with is, “What is the region’s carrying capacity?” How much population growth, water usage, traffic, and wastewater treatment can this box canyon handle? Are we OK with sprawl development on open mesas and with town sidewalks becoming as crowded on normal weekdays as they are during festivals? I strongly believe the Diamond Ridge development of for-sale homes would lead to significant population growth beyond providing homes for workers currently renting or commuting here.
I also predict it would open the rest of the mesa to further development, even if the first phase of Diamond Ridge amounts to “only” 240 homes, as per a recently inked municipal water agreement. We heard County Manager Mike Bordogna testify last spring, to secure a state grant to buy the land, that the county may seek to develop the remaining acreage. We’ve also seen a map from seller Jack Vickers that envisions upzoning the Diamond Ranch parcels farther down Last Dollar Road for a spa and many high-end homes once he has access to Town water.
I’m acutely aware of the need for more housing that public-sector and service-sector workers can afford. When I go to work as a substitute teacher in Telluride schools, I view the rectangular parcel next to the roundabout at the entrance to Town and think it’s one of several good places to build homes within walking and biking distance of services.
I could call all town residents “NIMBY” for deciding to keep these parcels closer to the urban core undeveloped, but I won’t, because I know smart people have legitimate concerns about building there (although I think those concerns could be mitigated). The point is, NIMBY name-calling doesn’t help navigate these tough issues; dialogue does.
