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Landowners seek exchange of urban growth boundaries - The Register-Guard, Eugene, Or... Page 1 of 4 <br /> www.registerguard.com I ©The Register-Guard, Eugene,Oregon <br /> November 6, 2003 <br /> Landowners seek exchange of urban <br /> growth boundaries <br /> By Joe Harwood <br /> The Register-Guard <br /> Eugene officials will consider an unprecedented land use swap <br /> that would expand the city's urban growth boundary to include <br /> farmland north of Irvington Drive, making room for a 77-acre <br /> community park and a 120-acre housing and commercial <br /> development. <br /> The plan, launched by Lane County businessmen Norman and <br /> Melvin McDougal, would give the park-starved Santa Clara <br /> area a huge new recreation site at no cost to the city. The <br /> McDougals own the 197-acre parcel that sits north of Irvington <br /> Drive, south of Beacon Drive West and east of Prairie Road. <br /> In exchange for giving the city 77 acres for a park, the <br /> McDougals want the city to bring the remaining 120 acres of <br /> farmland into the urban growth boundary. The brothers <br /> envision building a mixed use development of homes, <br /> apartments, duplexes and commercial businesses on the <br /> property if the city agrees to the concept. <br /> Expanding the urban growth boundary is not a simple task. At <br /> the state and local levels, the process becomes more difficult <br /> and complex if the expansion eats up prime farm or forest <br /> land. <br /> To offset the 120-acre addition of developable land in Santa <br /> Clara, the McDougals propose redrawing the urban growth <br /> boundary in south Eugene to take 120 acres of forested, <br /> hillside property they own that is now within the boundary, and <br /> place it outside the boundary. The swap would result in no net <br /> loss or gain of developable land inside the growth boundary <br /> surrounding Eugene. <br /> The south Eugene property, north of 30th Avenue, is part of <br /> about 350 acres the brothers own in the Laurel Hill Valley and <br /> Lane Community College basin. <br /> The urban growth boundary surrounds the Eugene-Springfield <br /> area. Land inside the boundary generally can be intensively <br /> developed, while development of land outside the boundary is <br /> strictly limited. <br /> The proposal would prove to be a big financial windfall for the <br /> http://www.registerguard.corn/cgi-bin/printStory.py?name=a1.mcdougal.1 1 06&date=2003 1 1... 11/12/03 <br />