By Terry Stokka
Reprinted by permission of the New Falcon Herald
It isn’t often that a developer spends a lot of money designing a residential development that is approved and then completely changes his mind and spends a lot more money designing a totally different development that is also approved and then changes his mind once again, going back to the original plan. The whole process and all it entails is expensive and mind boggling.
The owner of this complicated story is Classic Homes and the development is Flying Horse North. The original plan was for 283 lots 2.5 acres or larger. The lots covered only half of the parcel, so the remaining acreage was an 18-hole golf course and park space. The total area was 1,410 acres with a density of 5 acres per lot. The Black Forest Land Use Committee accepted the plan despite wishing the open space could be undeveloped trees and wildlife habitat, but the developer desired the “open space” to be the golf course and the county commissioners approved it.
Filing 1 for the development was for 81 lots and the golf course. Those lots are almost completely built-out with large, beautiful homes. Filing 2 was for just one lot under a special circumstance. For many months no further filings were submitted. Then a totally new sketch plan was submitted that changed the remaining 201 lots into 846 city-size lots plus a luxury 275-room hotel. The Land Use Committee was shocked at this change. The new plan would build a small town in the middle of Black Forest.
The negative consequences would be a five-fold increase in traffic through Filing 1 with the attendant congestion, light pollution, drainage problems, and a few other issues. The new plan would require a central water and wastewater system encompassing several deep wells, piping, water treatment, and massive expenditures for the infrastructure. As expected, the county commissioners approved the new sketch plan with the startling statement that they believed the new plan “generally conformed” to the old plan.
The new plan required many additional months of planning, dealing with water and wastewater issues and fleshing out the details. They then submitted Filing 3 under the old, approved plan since the new plan had not yet been fully approved. Now we are working under two plans at the same time. Filing 3 had lots of 2.5 acres surrounding the golf course.
Several months later, Filing 4 was submitted with lots 2.5 acres or larger. Soon after that, Filing 5 was submitted with lots 2.5 acres or larger. This was all in the area where the second plan had envisioned about 400 city-size lots.
In March 2025, Classic submitted Filings 6 and 7 for the remainder of the property composed of all 2.5-acre lots or larger, so that completes the story of the return to the original plan. The area where the hotel had been envisioned was labeled “golf course.” Classic Homes has gone back to the original plan of lots 2.5 acres or larger.
We are breathing a collective sigh of relief to not have the town of Flying Horse North in the middle of Black Forest with associated streetlights, traffic, green lawns, and congestion. We will be able to be proud of Flying Horse North and its beautiful homes on large lots. We say thank you to Classic Homes for going back to the original plan. Who knew that this development would jump through so many hoops and spend so much money on two different plans, only to return to the original plan.
Terry Stokka may be reached at contact@friendsofblackforest.org.
Note: OCN uses A Perspective on Our Community to run opinion pieces that are too long to run as Letters to Our Community, which are limited to 300 words.
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