Baker Ranch Park Design Workshop - Follow Up

This article is a follow up to the Baker Ranch Park Design workshop I reported on last week.

Baker Ranch is shaping up to be a fine looking addition to our community. According to the Baker Ranch reps, more than 20,000 people have visited the still under construction project, and already 100 units have been sold and there are some people actually living there right now.

THE SPLIT

But Baker Ranch is not without its problems, one of which is the narrowing of the street to 2 lanes as it passes through the project. It turns out that Alton Parkway runs right through the project, and for whatever reason, the City narrows the lanes as it hits the mid-point of the project. Now imagine this – it’s the normal Alton Parkway traffic. Plus now there are 2,300+ new homes, half of them feeding directly onto Alton from Baker Ranch, plus another 1,000 or so from the Brookfield, Trumark, and the Portola projects, all headed for those two lanes. Sounds a bit like Thermopylae and we’re the Persians.

The split of Baker Ranch by Alton Parkway also brings up the problem of moving around your neighborhood. The Baker Ranch people are big on talking about how everyone will move everywhere to socialize, walk the sun, sit on the lawn, etc. And it is a beautiful location with lots of good views. But when one of the participants in Thursday’s Park Design workshop asked how they were going to go from one side of Alton to the other, where several parks will be, Baker Ranch reps said – “Wait for the light.” Hmmm. The young man was advised not to wear his speedo when crossing the street, because who knows how long the light is going to take, given the current traffic conditions in the City and the still incomplete traffic synchronization that has been going on for nearly a decade and shows no signs of completion in the near future. Apparently Baker Ranch has identified this as a problem, but no clear solutions have emerged.

THE WORKSHOP

Turning to the park design workshop itself, I was impressed with how much thought has gone into the nearly dozen parks and what a variety of amenities Baker Ranch will provide. Indeed, some of these parks are already finished, and many of the features in the other parks are already in place. That’s really nice for the people who move in now, as they will have wonderful amenities and not so many people to have to share them with (unless one of those pesky inmates escapes from Musick Jail).

Which brings us to the original purpose of the workshop, which was to ask people what they wanted in their parks. If almost every feature of every park has already been decided, I’m not sure what the purpose of the meeting was. Indeed, among the dozen plus people who attended, the questions were sparse, because it was clear that there was little input needed. The Baker Ranch people did hand out a sheet of paper with a list of amenities, and people were asked to indicate which ones they wanted most, etc.  But it seemed perfunctory in light of the plans we were shown. I’m not complaining. The parks look really nice. But with so much completed and so much already set, I’m not sure there was really any purpose for the workshop.

THE DOG PARK

Conspicuously missing from the list of existing and possible amenities was a “dog park”, which I thought had already been decided upon long ago, and was a prominent part of the pitch by the Baker Ranch people and indeed features prominently in their over-sized billboards (see the insert). Just to be sure, I checked the City’s website and on page 7-7 of the tract maps, there was the “dog park” and on page 7-10 I found this comment – “A dog park serving the canine population is located to the north of the great lawn.” One of the people attending the workshop with me inquired about the missing dog park and was told “It was under consideration.”  Just to be sure, I went to their website to get a contact name/number but there was none. So I went to their Facebook page and asked the question and got this response –

“The proposed Dog Park is in addition to the parks shown in the Baker Ranch area plan. If approved, the Dog Park would be built by Shea/Baker Ranch Associates. We understand a Dog Park is important to many residents of Lake Forest and hope to find a positive resolution with the city. Further information regarding the Dog Park will be published as it becomes available.”

Apparently the dog park that was promised as part of the Baker Ranch project is now off the table, and in place of this, there is a proposal to build a dog park “on City property immediately adjacent to Baker Ranch.” I will report on this in a future story.