LV sprawl expands ring around the valley

Launce Rake

Sunday, Sept. 5, 1999 | 10:18 a.m.

A decade ago Tony Clayton moved to a sparsely settled area in Lone Mountain to raise a family and run a small horse ranch.

Today his ranch is in the middle of a suburban subdivision, with convenience stores and high-density housing sprouting up less than a half-mile away.

"Don't like it," Clayton says, pointing to the heavy traffic that now flies by in front of his house. "They say it's progress, but I don't know. Now you see nothing but the lights and the growth and the development."

Clayton and his Lone Mountain neighbors are living with sprawl. Clayton fears that the city and the problems that 10 years ago were a safe distance away -- strip malls, air pollution and bumper-to-bumper traffic -- will only get worse with time.

It isn't only Lone Mountain. In Clark County 20,000 acres are being paved over per year, more than two acres of land every hour, according to Michael Naylor, director of air pollution control for the county health district.

As a result, Las Vegas Valley residents are experiencing polluted air, traffic congestion, longer commutes and signs blocking the view of the mountains. Add to those growing headaches possible price increases for land and water and you get an idea of the valley's future.

Growth, and its effects and the quality of life in the valley, will be the subject of a series of meetings beginning Sep. 14. Hosted by the Sierra Club and Citizen Alert, two nonprofit organizations concerned with environmental issues, the meetings will bring together county and state officials with citizens in a "town hall" setting.

Development of outlying areas and urban growth -- or sprawl, depending on your point of view -- is far from just an issue for the valley.

Voters last November approved nearly 200 anti-sprawl initiatives across the country, and nearly half of the nation's governors referred to sprawl in their inaugural or state of the state speeches this year, according to Cox News Service.

In Southern Nevada, the driving force behind growth is the success of the principal industry -- gaming. Every new hotel room in the valley attracts 10 new workers, says David James, chairman of UNLV's civil and environmental engineering department.

The valley now has about 1.3 million people, almost double the 700,000 people that state and local officials say lived here 10 years ago. State officials believe that number could double again within the next two decades, although county planners put the 2020 population at 2.1 million.

All those people moving to the valley -- swelling the population by about 60,000 a year -- need a place to live.

Even environmentalists, though unhappy with the pace of development in the valley, say they recognize the need for more housing.

Scattershot development

Sprawl, says Sierra Club organizer Deanna White, is the organization's number one concern in Southern Nevada.

The development of the valley has been scattershot, she argues, and the result has been a tremendous increase in air and water pollution, flooding and the deterioration of the natural environment surrounding the area.

"These are all pretty big warning signs that there is a problem," White says.

White and other environmentalists say that increasing the density in the already developed parts of the valley -- putting more people closer to the center of the urban area -- is one way to avoid further problems.

Commuting is at the heart of many of the environmental problems associated with urban development. Longer commutes mean more cars on the road for longer periods, spewing exhaust into the already polluted air.

Commuting times in Las Vegas have risen 36 percent since 1980, the county's transportation commission has found. And it's only going to get worse. Phillip J. Shinbein, a transportation planner for the county, estimates that a 20-minute commute today will take about 50 minutes by the year 2020.

Developers are expanding the boundaries, agrees Jeff van Ee, an environmental activist and member of the Southern Nevada Strategic Planning Authority, which was charged with forming plans for long-term, sustainable development of the valley.

But cars aren't the only problem. According to the county's air pollution control division, almost half the particulate pollution from fuel combustion in the valley comes from construction vehicles alone -- nearly 2,500 tons of exhaust per year.

Construction activity also puts more than 63 percent of the valley's dust into the air, 46,000 tons per year. The federal Environmental Protection Agency has identified dust and other particulate pollution as an important health and quality of life issue.

Van Ee says he knows that growth will continue in the valley, but he'd like to change the way it is happening.

"There's no question that many developers have gone with the traditional philosophy of buy low, sell high." he says. "They are almost racing to the very edges of the valley to acquire that land as cheaply as possible."

As an example, he points to the probable development of 7,500 acres of land on the north side of North Las Vegas, land now owned by the federal Bureau of Land Management. To the north of that land is federal Fish and Wildlife Service property -- exactly the type of resource he fears will suffer after neighboring areas are built up.

White and other environmentalists want more incentives for people to live downtown, including better services and amenities like parks. Her point of view is shared by Mayor Oscar Goodman and other policy-makers in Las Vegas and their counterparts in North Las Vegas and Henderson.

When people talk about the negative effects of growth, the words most frequently used are "quality of life."

When people move out to the suburban perimeter, they are seeking a better life: a patch of green lawn, a newer home, jogging paths, a lifestyle that, in the master-planned communities, comes prepackaged.

Environmentalists, by and large, don't like the communities, which include Summerlin, Green Valley, and the Anthem communities of Henderson. They say that the communities encourage longer commutes and have generally lower density than the smaller developments sandwiched inside the urbanized areas.

But developers say that they aren't responsible for sprawl.

"The developers didn't create the growth," says Mark Fine, a real-estate developer and consultant who has contributed to some of the region's biggest master-planned communities, including Summerlin and Green Valley. "The engine of the growth has really been the resort industry. The megaresorts have a huge, voracious appetite for labor.

"There are jobs in Las Vegas, and that's why they're moving to Las Vegas," says Fine, who has been active in political and civic affairs in the valley. He unsuccessfully ran against Goodman to be Las Vegas mayor last spring.

Fine says the master-planned communities provide necessities and amenities for residents that smaller developments don't offer. The large communities must pay part or all of the cost to establish sewer and water lines, roads, schools and parks.

"You'll find a lot of these nonplanned areas are really becoming part of your sprawl, where you don't have your parks and your schools," Fine says. "If you're not in a master-planned community, the parks don't seem to get built."

"As long as people keep moving to Southern Nevada, they're going to need homes," agrees Sean Patrick, a spokesman for Del Webb Corp. The company is the primary mover behind the two-phased Anthem developments in Henderson, which ultimately would cover about 5,000 acres.

The next planned communities may be larger than the ones that came before them. In North Las Vegas, the city is eyeing the huge 7,500-acre BLM tract, all of it slated for development as a master-planned community.

"We're trying to get authority from the government to acquire the 7,500 acres and to manage or direct its development," said deputy city attorney Mark Zalaoras. "What we'd like to do, ideally, is ... master plan the entire 7,500 acres."

Anti-growth policies

Boulder City, a conservative enclave in the southern tip of the valley, is hardly known as a home for radical environmentalists. But it is home to the most radical anti-growth policies in the valley.

Since 1979 Boulder City's growth has been set at 120 housing units per year.

"Most of the populace of the community really don't want to grow like Las Vegas or Henderson have in the past few years," explains John Hoole, Boulder City's community development director. "They're trying to maintain the old ways here, and doing it fairly successfully."

In 1998 the town had 14,730 residents; two years earlier, the town had 14,460 -- an increase of 330 people, or slightly less than 2 percent in two years. By contrast, the rest of the valley had a population increase of more than 100,000 in the same period, more than a 10-percent increase.

That kind of hard "no-build" policy won't work for the rest of the valley, argue government planners, developers and even some environmentalists. Too many people are moving here to simply stop building new homes; the newcomers would have no place to live.

In Henderson, traditionally a bedroom community supplying workers for Las Vegas, city planners and policy makers are working to attract light industry and offices to the city center.

Only about 10 percent of Henderson's residents work inside the city limits but the city has a goal of 25 percent, says Bristol S. Ellington, the assistant community development director.

The U.S. Census Bureau tagged Henderson as the "fastest-growing city in America" for cities over 100,000 in 1995, 1997 and 1998. As of July, the city had about 180,000 residents.

While that kind of growth might crush other cities, Ellington says Henderson officials have been able to control the negative effects through sound planning.

Ellington says the city is demanding, and developers such as Del Webb are providing, significant concessions.

"One of Henderson's best tools for ensuring economical, orderly growth and development patterns is properly timing municipal improvements," Ellington says. That means requiring developers to help pay for new sewer lines, roads, schools and parks -- and making sure the work is done before the properties are opened up to residents.

Unlike Henderson, Las Vegas doesn't have a lot of neighboring areas to spread into, although developers can continue to fill in within the city for decades.

Other town limits are likely to keep expanding, largely thanks to the U.S. Congress. Congress in 1998 directed the federal government to sell or exchange 27,000 acres of Clark County land -- land that almost certainly will go to commercial development around Henderson and North Las Vegas.

Ellington agrees that there are environmental impacts from fast growth, but he says regional cooperation, inter-local agreements and the recently created Regional Planning Coalition can control the worst of the problems.

Van Ee and other environmentalists are skeptical about the planning process and the contributions of developers.

"Even though the developer pays to provide many services to develop that property, there are hidden costs that all of us residing in the metro Las Vegas area pay," he says. Van Ee says older roads that quickly deteriorate under heavier traffic loads are one example of the taxpayer picking up the check for developments.

Tom Perrigo, planning supervisor for the city of Las Vegas, argues that those who decry development in the valley need a reality check.

"Just because we're growing rapidly, is that sprawl?" he asks. "I don't know if you can call the city of Las Vegas a sprawl city.

"Sprawl would imply leapfrog development," he says. "That's not really happening here...The rate of land consumption equals the rate of population growth."

The valley can only grow so far, some argue.

The limits are controlled by federal lands which ring the valley and make up 90 percent of the property in Clark County.

Another limit is water. Nearly all the valley's drinking water comes from the Colorado River, and Nevada's share is set by a multistate compact.

But the federal government could play a role in renegotiating that compact, giving the valley more water to meet the needs of more people, says Dale Devitt, director of UNLV's Center for Urban Water Conservation.

"A state like Nevada may well be allowed to buy water from neighboring states," Devitt says. More efficient use and reuse policies also are likely to make more water available for future growth, he believes. But absent movement on those fronts, the region could run out of water for growth within a decade, he says.

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that things are moving quickly," Devitt says.

The biggest way to conserve water is to control demand -- and that means making it more expensive, he says. Devitt sees a day in the not-too-distant future when the price of water could rise five-fold over today's cost.

"How do you get the average person in the neighborhood interested in saving water? One of the most powerful tools the (Las Vegas Water) district has is water pricing," he says. "We would like to have people who move here from all parts of the country realize that this is, first and foremost, a desert."

However, an October 1997 study by the Urban Land Institute warns that depending on the federal government to provide water and land for growth is a dangerous gamble.

If the valley doesn't get a larger share from the Colorado River compact and more land from the BLM, "it seems certain that current growth patterns will consume the available supplies of land and water within 10 to 20 years," the institute warned. Land and water shortages will raise developments costs and affect the quality, cost and pace of growth, the institute cautioned.

Quality of life

For many of the valley's residents, sprawl simply isn't a problem, according to city and county planners. They cite studies that show residents aren't overly concerned about growth; the same studies show that residents are willing to spend more money to correct the related problems of air and water pollution and traffic congestion.

But for those who, years ago, moved from the built-up areas to own larger plots of land, raise horses or simply get away from the hubbub of town, and now find themselves with strip malls outside their front gates, disagree. For them, sprawl is affecting their quality of life.

Perhaps the only sure-fire way for a homeowner to avoid that kind of change is to buy enough property to insulate himself from development , suggests Lesa Coder, director of the county's Current Planning Division.

Lone Mountain in the northwest is a prime example of an area in transition. No master-planned communities are on the drawing board, but the once sparsely developed area has been gobbled up by new housing developments.

The neighborhoods near Interstate 95 are dotted with "for-sale" signs as residents choose to move farther out from Las Vegas' core.

But Tony Clayton is sticking with his small horse ranch on Craig Road. He has purchased a neighboring 2.5-acre plot to preserve a piece of land to ride horses.

"We feel closed in now," Clayton says. But he believes moving isn't the answer, since development will eventually reach his family even if they move another 10 miles from the urban center.

Under the county's master plan, the area where Clayton lives is zoned for homes on half-acre plots. Although that represents more homes than used to be there, some development companies have tried to get zoning changes to allow greater densities.

Most of those efforts have been unsuccessful, in part because of the resistance from citizens' groups, including the North West Citizens Association. Donald and Janet Tracey, members of the group, moved into their house on a half-acre off Dapple Gray Road about four years ago.

Coder says scrutiny from the public will help preserve low-density zoning. But she also warns that zoning plans, and the county's master plan, will change in response to growth.

"You've got to constantly keep your eyes out" for developers looking to change the zoning to allow greater density, Donald Tracey says. "We've got a group of people dedicated to doing what is necessary."

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