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TU 3-26-2002 - Work on mega community in Clay already under way

http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/032602/met_8976423.html

Work on mega community in Clay already under way
OakLeaf should start home construction before Nocatee



By Binyamin Appelbaum
Times-Union staff writer

ORANGE PARK -- Plans will be unveiled today for the development of a series of residential communities, commercial centers and office parks on the Duval-Clay county line that could eventually include 11,000 homes and a new regional mall.

The 6,400-acre OakLeaf Plantation will rise on land owned by developer Hutson Land Co. It includes substantial areas along both sides of Branan-Chaffee Road in Clay County and immediately surrounding the intersection of Branan-Chaffee Road and Argyle Forest Boulevard in Duval County.

When completed, OakLeaf will cover an area larger than the Cecil Commerce Center. The future parkland alone is the size of Palencia, an upscale community on the Intracoastal Waterway in St. Johns County. The previous giants of the Clay development scene, Eagle Harbor and Fleming Island Plantation, could both fit comfortably within its bounds. The only meaningful precedent is Nocatee, a planned 15,000-acre community draped over the Duval-St. Johns county line.

Road construction has already begun to the east of Branan-Chaffee Road on the first phase of OakLeaf, a series of subdivisions with lots for 2,200 homes arranged in wedges around a community center and retail district. Home construction in the area, dubbed OakLeaf East, could begin by fall, with prices ranging from the low $100,000s to the $400,000s.

Roads are also under construction for a second phase to the west of Branan-Chaffee Road, a 1,000-acre golf-course community to be built by Centex Homes. Preliminary plans show a golf course bounded by navigable canals at the core of a community.

Land designated for a regional mall, office and industrial parks and commercial centers will remain a tree farm for the time being. So will a chunk of residential land the size of the first two phases combined.

"It's an area of our county and Duval County where we needed some top quality development," said Clay County Commissioner Larry Lancaster, one among a chorus of officials who welcomed the project. Many will be on hand today for a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Argyle Forest Boulevard.

OakLeaf is similar in scale to Nocatee but, although Nocatee was announced three years ago, OakLeaf should start home construction first. Hutson already holds the necessary permits, hand-me-downs from the Gulfstream Corp., which set out in the mid-1970s to build Argyle Forest, an almost exclusively residential community between Blanding Boulevard and the outskirts of Cecil Field.

Gulfstream ran out of money and sold its land holdings to Hutson in 1994. Hutson used the land for hunting and tree farming until Branan-Chaffee Road opened and Cecil Commerce Center boomed.

Development will begin as Jacksonville prepares to plow millions into area road construction as part of the Better Jacksonville Plan and Clay County prepares to finalize a land use and road construction plan for the surrounding area.

"This will be Main and Main," said Hutson president Donald Hinson, standing among pine trees and waving at the future.

Homebuilders seem to agree. Already, the company has racked up $60 million in lot sales.

Like Eagle Harbor and Fleming Island Plantation, OakLeaf will cover the cost of its own infrastructure with municipal bonds that will be paid off by future residents. Hutson will also donate sites to Clay County for five schools, two fire stations and a library.

It is a welcome gesture in a county struggling to pay for evermore roads and schools.

"To me, this is the optimum kind of development," Lancaster said. "This is growth with planned infrastructure."

The fact that those plans include a mixture of homes and jobs also brings smiles to official faces.

"It provides a liveable and sustainable community," said Jacksonville Councilwoman Alberta Hipps. "I'm looking forward to seeing it."

The possibility of working where you live is a ways down the road, however. The first phases are entirely residential.

As with other planned communities, OakLeaf's developers and homebuilders are betting they can sell homes at a premium by selling the idea of community.

The first phase, OakLeaf East, features a village center with 15 surrounding subdivisions on a bronchial road network -- arterial, feeder, cul-de-sac.

Hinson said the community was designed with kids in mind. The village center will include an elementary school, a water park and playing fields within walking distance from most of the home sites. Bike trails will connect cul-de-sacs, giving pedestrians and cyclists greater freedom than drivers. Bridges will fly over major roads.

The preliminary plan for the Centex golf course community substitutes a golf course for the village center. The concept for the course, by Weed Golf Course Design of Ponte Vedra, is a compact run of holes with a residential periphery. The firm has also designed courses at Fleming Island, the World Golf Village and Amelia Island.

"It's a journey over hill and dale rather than through someone's back yard," said Weed designer Chris Monti.

Monti could well be describing the fate of commuters if OakLeaf fails to attract employers. After all, the community is adjacent to the vast and largely vacant Cecil Commerce Center.

But Hinson is confident OakLeaf will not suffer the same frustrations visited upon previous attempts to bring employers to Clay County. He said the presence of Cecil Commerce Center is a positive because smaller companies will spin off to the outskirts of the giant aerospace park.

"We know we're not going to be working on airplanes, but smaller companies will want to be here," he said. "I don't think there is any other place in Clay County that has this much good transportation and is this close to downtown."

The initial push may come on the strength of existing communities along Argyle Forest Boulevard. The Regency Realty Group, a developer of supermarket-anchored retail complexes, has purchased properties at the northwest and southeast corners of Argyle Forest Boulevard and Branan-Chaffee Road. The company did not return calls for comment.

Staff writer Binyamin Appelbaum can be reached at (904) 278-9431 or bappelbaum@jacksonville.com.

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Important Oakleaf Plantation Web Links and News Articles

OakLeaf Plantation Official Web Site
TU 3-26-2002 - Work on mega community in Clay already under way
TU Article 3-27-2002 - Clay officials hope OakLeaf brings jobs
Oakleaf Plantation Map - Large PDF File
TU Article 11-27-2002- Kids from OakLeaf would attend Tynes Elem
TU Article 4-26-2002 - Cecil Field area to get golf course commu
All TimesUnion Articles that Contain Oakleaf Plantation for 2002
Oakleaf Developer - The Hutson Companies
OakLeaf Builders - OakLeaf Plantation Web Link