|  | ![]() | Planned Community Helps Protect Rare Southern Appalachian LandscapeHot Springs, Virginia – May 20, 2005 In Bath County, Virginia, preservation has not only taken precedence over profit; it has also created it. This spring Homestead Preserve will break ground for the first phase of a 450-home planned community on 2,300 acres in the Allegheny Mountains on a landscape that could have supported as many as 2,700 homes.
Instead, in a rare and daring move, Homestead Preserve developers have elected to preserve the natural landscape for future generations. Of their original 11,500-acre purchase in 2002, they elected to sell 9,250 acres on and around Warm Springs Mountain to The Nature Conservancy and, in October 2004, placed an additional 935 acres into permanent conservation easements with the Virginia Outdoors Foundation. The developers have also established a “building envelope” on each individual home site to further protect the integrity of the landscape. These actions will insure that no more than 325 acres, or less than 3% of the original 11,500-acres purchased, will ever be affected by development.
“We hope Homestead Preserve will set a precedent,” says managing director Charles Adams, “and show that when developers emphasize preservation, they actually enhance the value of their property. We’re not only preserving a natural landscape for future generations, we’re satisfying a desire that families have to be in a place where natural heritage still has meaning.”
Michael Lipford, Virginia state director of The Nature Conservancy, describes the area well: “These are the landscapes our founding fathers owned, wrote about, traveled across, were inspired by, and gained spiritual strength from.”
Not only has Homestead Preserve provided for the conservation of a precious landscape that includes one of only about 20 of the world’s rare montane pine barrens, it has also created a rush on the part of buyers to claim a piece of this exclusive community dedicated to natural conservation. Since early January, Homestead Preserve has sold 99 undeveloped home sites at prices between $250,000 and $1 million for tracts of ½ to 10 acres. To date, Homestead Preserve developers have sold more than $40 million in real estate.
All homes constructed at Homestead Preserve must meet strict historic architecture guidelines and be designed to blend into or complement the natural landscape. Working closely with Pittsburgh-based Urban Design Associates, Homestead Preserve has developed a Pattern Book that details the area’s rich architectural history, settlement patterns and even native plants and trees appropriate for landscaping. Architectural styles included in the Pattern Book and approved for Homestead Preserve include Highlands Classical, Highlands Arts and Crafts, English Romantic, and Highlands Farmhouse.
Homestead Preserve developers Charles Adams and partner Don Killoren were instrumental in the design and development of Celebration, Florida, near Orlando, which was hailed as the “Most Advanced Community in the Country from 1996-1998” by the The Guinness Book of World Records.
Crosland, Inc. of Charlotte, NC is a financial partner in Homestead Preserve, and Crosland’s President and CEO Todd Mansfield was also directly involved in the development and success of Celebration, Florida. Crosland, Inc. is one of the Southeast’s leading and most diversified real estate companies. For more information, call Deborah Huso at (540) 839-5147, or e-mail writewell@tds.net.
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