Land Deal for Pony Express Expansion

[print-me/] During the City Council Meeting on December 5th, the Eagle Mountain City Council agreed to modifying the Overland / SITLA Master Development Plan (MDP) and the Master Development Agreement. The Staff report gives this background, “The SITLA (State of Utah School Institutional Trust Lands Administration) master development plan and agreement was approved in 2003, vesting the Mid-Valley portion of the project with 3,564 maximum residential units at an average density of 3 units per acre. Ivory Development has partnered with SITLA to develop the 1,188-acre Mid-Valley portion of their existing master development plan. The Mid-Valley portion of the plan is located between the City Center and The Ranches.” The plan includes a total of 8 different villages (the preliminary plan for the 1st village was also included in the plan). There were a few changes to the first Village plan that the City Council required as part of the approval. The plan includes a total of 3,800 new units. The City Council and the Developer have agreed that all multi-family housing is to be limited to village 5 and village 8. Ivory, the developer, does not consider town homes as multi-family because each of them is owned by a separate entities. So the developer does have the ability to put in town homes in the other villages, but they have to keep to total unit count to 3800 for the entire development. They are given some flexibility on village unit count and can move 10-20% of the units between villages as they propose them to the City Council and Planning Commission in the future. For example: Village one is currently under construction and has a proposed count of 539 units, and is 193.9 acres in size. But it also has a minimum count of 431, and a maximum count of 647. This allows the developer to adjust to current markets and increase or decrease the number of units per acre to the limits set.

Steve Mumford, Eagle Mountain Community Development Director, discusses the benefits this agreement has, “The Overland project, which has been in the works by Ivory Homes for two years, will provide better transportation (including the potential to widen Pony Express Parkway), a better overall parks and trails system, and additional recreation/community property. We look forward to the new neighborhoods and quality housing that will come as a result of this SITLA/Ivory partnership. This is a definite improvement over the 2003 plan and agreement that was previously in place.” This agreement also included dedication of land for several items that will help mitigate some of Eagle Mountains transportation problems. The dedication of property will, in the future, allow Pony Express Parkway to be expanded to 4 lanes. The agreement includes dedication of additional property for the expansion of Pony Express Parkway to a 152-foot right of way (ROW) (Major Arterial Road) as well as dedication of additional property for High School Road. The City Council also discussed with the developer if they would be willing to increase the amount of dedicated land so that a turn lane from High School Road to Pony Express Parkway could be added to help with traffic waiting to turn from High School Road. (NOTE: the above figures are, “from a draft document and needs to be updated for the MDA. It shows a 20’ additional ROW will be dedicated on each side of Pony Express Parkway; however, they will be dedicating 31 feet on each side to equal a 152-foot total ROW.”) Unrelated to roads the developer will also dedication one 13.2-acre Recreational Parcel for future community or recreational use (this land is adjacent to the new Cory Wride Memorial park). There were also items in the agreement that required parks to be required prior to a certain number of units being built in each village. The developer also agreed to give $1.71 million to the city in three separate payments for Cory Wride Memorial Park improvements. The ordinance and resolution passed the City Council with a 4-0 vote.