BY DENNIS HARTIG
VIRGINIA BEACH — A Peninsula developer will soon begin seeking permission from the city of Virginia Beach to transform the failed Signature at West Neck golf course into a pastoral landscape upon which 153 Southern Living-style homes and townhouses will be dispersed.
It would be known as Signature Meadows.
The developer told The Independent News a request to rezone a property that has been at the center of community controversies should be filed in the next two months.
William “Billy” Almond, the principal landscape architect on the planned project, said it would convert the former course at West Neck into “a very eco-friendly community with an abundance of open space.”
“Instead of looking out your window and seeing an overgrown golf course, you are looking at a manicured meadow,” Almond said during an interview on Wednesday, May 24.
A rezoning application will come from Harrison & Lear, a 70-year-old land development company. Its president, Jonathan Skinner, told The Independent News his company has an option to buy and repurpose the golf course if the rezoning it will seek is approved by the City Council. Skinner and Almond gave the newspaper an overview of the plans.
The land is owned by JBWK LLC, which bought it two years ago after the golf course failed and was closed. The property owner has been embroiled ever since in ongoing disputes with the West Neck Community Association and the Indian River Plantation Homeowners Association, as well as with city inspectors, over overgrown conditions. A court case about maintenance led to a settlement between the property owner and the city last year.
The two neighborhood organizations govern the 1,200 homes that wind in and around the fairways. A Tuesday, March 7, brush fire that scorched 36 acres brought the dispute to a boil. JBWK, the city and the associations traded words and correspondence, triggering more threats of legal action but no progress on a resolution to disagreements about the fate of the land.
“This is a long-term solution to a problem that no one else has been able to solve,” Skinner told The Independent News.
The rezoning will have to overcome two hurdles: opposition of neighborhood leaders who insist the land must only be used for the golf course they were promised when they bought their homes and, second, the argument that permitting more homes in West Neck could create a precedent that would make it hard for the council to vote against more homes on nearby farmland in a part of the city in which development faces constraints.
The Signature Meadows proposal was shaped over the last year by a steering committee of 30 residents of West Neck and Indian River Plantation, including several who insist on a “golf course or nothing,” Skinner said. He added that they also met with residents during a meeting last year that packed a theater within the movie house at Strawbridge Marketplace.
Skinner said the planned conversion of the golf course has these major elements:
- Of the 202 acres under contract, the 153 dwellings would occupy 19 acres. These would be built in five villages including one with a “great lawn” inspired by green spaces at East Beach in Norfolk and the Cavalier at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront.
- A “dramatic expansion of amenities that unlike the golf course could be used by everyone” in West Neck and Indian River Plantation. This includes miles of walking and biking trails through maintained meadows, the expansion of ponds into lakes for kayaking, plus pickle ball courts, exercise stations, sitting areas and dog parks.
- Reforestation of 30 acres.
- In all, the plan would convert 120 acres of fairways requiring watering, fertilizing and pesticides into “environmentally friendly and sustaining uses.” Said Almond, “This takes one of the highest polluting uses out of the Southern Rivers Watershed.” Included in this 120 acres are the meadows, trails, passive areas, gardens and dog parks.
- The open space and recreation areas will be for the use of the residents, not the public. Access will be controlled with key fob entry at gates. Skinner said people from communities immediately surrounding the area could buy a fob for access, as well.
- The cost of maintaining the open spaces will come from a portion of the fees paid to the new homeowners association by the new residents.
Skinner said he is well aware of adamant opposition to additional homes, to “anything but a golf course” and to the fear that this might open the floodgates for more homes.
Skinner said there are not enough golfers in the area to make a go of a course that has already failed. Hundreds of golf courses have failed across the nation in recent years, and many are being transformed into pastoral open spaces. Signature Meadows borrows, he said, from the best of those ideas.
And of the objection to additional houses, Skinner said that without public investment, the solution must have private investment.
“In order to do what we are trying to do, you need to have a revenue stream,” he said. The additional homes create the revenue stream for a solution.
Almond does not believe the rezoning will set a precedent for three reasons.
First, West Neck was rezoned under a different set of rules than now govern a transition area between more suburban development in the northern city and the rural area in southern Virginia Beach – and the housing density in the proposal is less than is now possible for residential development within that area.
Second, the proposal would only set a precedent if there was another golf course in that area of the city that failed and sought to be redeveloped with housing.
Almond noted that the development would not take away a “green field” but happen within an area that already is developed.
“We’re in the middle of the donut,” he noted, and Skinner characterized the plan as “infill development.”
Finally, the fate of about 200 acres on the former golf course presents a unique set of circumstances, challenges and tradeoffs for municipal leaders and community leaders who are unhappy with the property as it exists today.
Skinner said he believed the plan would please most of the residents, improve the quality of life of those around the former course and increase neighboring property values.
© 2023 Pungo Publishing Co., LLC
Was the Harrison Lear “article” an advertisement or a PR statement? It certainly didn’t appear the author asked and answered any of the serious questions existing homeowners might have.
Thanks for your comment. This is John, the editor.
This is one of the stories we have published about the former course and related issues. It is in the public interest to know as many specifics about this project as possible and get the development team on the record.
Readers can do with this information what they will, agree or disagree, but now they have it before any request has been filed.
And, for locals interested in this matter, it might be worth picking up this coming weekend’s print edition, as well.
Did you question him whether he included infrastructure and schools in his new fluff neighborhood? Because in his “Neverland Neighborhood” the roads leading into it remains the same both from West Neck and Princess Anne Roads. In addition, the plans didn’t include additional new schools? How about extra police officers?
Of course not, he is from Florida so he wrecks our peaceful neighborhood and leaves.
Although I am not a golfer, my wife and I paid $10,000 extra for our home to be built backing up to the Arthur Palmer designed golf course here. It was a delightful view out our back exposure and it was maintained very well.
Will we be reimbursed for our expense paid to have the open expanse of the well kept golf course? I doubt it. My wife suffers from both asthma and allergies which have increased in intensity as a result of the head-high weeds and grasses directly behind our home. The spectre of another fire is
worrisome as we have large pine trees which are close to our home while still being on the golf course property.
I moved into West Neck because I wanted to live in a 55+ community. Since “Signature Meadows” would have to drive on Legendary and Cadence to get to their neighborhoods, I don’t see why they can’t be made to be part of West Neck Association, meaning they, too, would have to observe the 55+ restrictions. Also, they would pay into the $65 every WN resident pays. In addition, the increased traffic from those 153 homes would mean at least 300 more vehicles on our 2 main roads. And remember, those are just H&L’s initial plans for the defunct golf course. Who knows how many more residential structures are planned for the future? Finally, what price range will these homes be offered? I really, REALLY don’t want section 8 housing among our $500,000+ homes!
Note from John, the editor: I understand there are strong feelings about this story, one of the many we have written about matters involving West Neck. Please consider the venue and avoid personal attacks and potentially defamatory comments. Thanks.
Very Simply STATED~ Our homes were purchased by ALL who live here in the once beautiful West Neck Community with the understanding that the Community would ALWAYS have a golf course.
Many owners paid a premium to have golf course views.
Those of us who are not on the Golf Course were told and promised “…the Golf Course will always remain a golf course”.
Now work to uphold those parameters~
Plain and Simple ~ JUST DO IT!