Building Around Nature

As the Twin Cities continue to overtake cornfields, local governments, developers, and homebuyers have become increasingly committed to preserving the state’s natural resources, both for biodiversity and scenic beauty. Often, land once owned by a single family is being carved into subdivisions. When the land has valuable natural resources, communities and builders are choosing to protect it through conservation easements or homeowner association covenants. Conservation easements are legal agreements by which landowners voluntarily limit development on part of their land, transferring with ownership to ensure the land remains protected through the generations.

Several such developments are currently being built in Minnesota and Wisconsin, all with varying degrees of conservation features. The first principle of conservation development is minimizing changes to the land and restoring natural resources to maintain or enhance ecological function and biodiversity. “We really are stewards of the land,” says Keith Waters of Keith Waters & Assoc. in Eden Prairie. “We are saving it for the next generation.”

Land Stewardship
Portico on the Green in Minnetonka, a Waters development, sits on a twenty-five-acre parcel of land that was previously owned by a single family. Originally, this land had six wetlands of varying quality. A conservation easement with the City of Minnetonka now protects 65 percent of the total land area. “We have a commitment to remove the nonnative species like buckthorn and to plant the native species you would expect to see in the wetlands,” Waters says. Other areas being preserved and restored include hardwood forest, upland prairie, and wetland edge. When completed, the development will also have twenty-five individually designed homes.

Inspiration, a conservation development in Bayport by Contractor Property Developers Co. in Roseville, is a 245-acre neighborhood. More than half of the total land area, or 145 acres, is protected by a conservation easement held by the Minnesota Land Trust, a nonprofit conservation organization. This development currently has a staff naturalist and nature center. The property, most recently a cornfield, originally had three main ecosystems: oak savannah, native prairie, and wetlands. Now, however, much of the degraded ecosystems will be restored to their original state.

“It takes a monumental effort to bring a cornfield into a natural prairie,” says Andy Dahl, Inspiration’s naturalist and salesperson. “But it will benefit all of the animals in the food chain, from insects to birds of prey.” Dahl estimates that prairie restoration will take five years. When developing the property, Dahl says, “We underemphasized the role of engineers and overemphasized the role of ecologists.” When completed in 2012, Inspiration will have 253 single-family homes and one cooperative building.

The fifty-acre Foxborough development in Lino Lakes has conservation easements on twenty-seven acres of restored forests, prairie, and wetlands. The developer, Royal Oaks Realty in Shoreview, is restoring a degraded wetland to a native sedge meadow, an effort that will take five to ten years, according to Mike Black, the project manager. “An enormous amount of buckthorn has been removed from the wooded areas,” Black says. When completed, this development will have fifty-seven single-family homes.

Another development, Cannon Bluffs in Cannon Falls, sits on the  bluffs of the Cannon River and is regulated by Wild and Scenic River legislation and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, which was given a conservation easement on the property decades ago. Today, seventy-five acres of this 150-acre site are protected. The protected cedar glade, which leads down to the Cannon River, has natural deer paths that will be left untouched. “It’s wonderful,” says Linda Ingle, managing partner of Cannon Bluffs in Cannon Falls. “You can eat wild blackberries on your way down to the river.” The development will have a total of forty single-family homes.

The 110-acre Diamond Lake Woods development in Dayton has a conservation easement on fifty acres of restored prairie, hardwood forest, and wetlands. This wildlife sanctuary is a stopover spot for migrating swans and supports hawks and waterfowl. “It’s not necessarily about giving the animals more space, but about creating a safe place for them to live,” says Gretchen Hempel, land and contract manager with Christian Builders in Rogers, the company that will be building the development’s twenty-nine single-family homes.

Alternative Routes
Not all developments that follow conservation practices have easements on the property. Tamarack Point in Cable, Wis., is a case in point. The developer, Property Focus LLC of Edina, plans to restore 1,800 feet of shoreline that will be shared among eighteen to twenty year-round, high-end cottages on this fifty-five-acre site, which is protected by association covenants. “We are really obsessed with water quality and protecting the lake,” says developer Mike Burg. “I believe in shared lakeshore. The traditional Wisconsin style of development, carving up lakeshore, can’t go on.” Tamarack Point was purchased from a single owner who had a cabin on the property’s peninsula. “We are removing the cabin and restoring the land to native grasses and trees,” Burg says.

Credit River Territory in Credit River Township is another such development. This 700-acre site has thirty-three acres of wetland, 142 acres of prairie and meadows, and some wooded areas protected by association covenants. The number of homes that will be built on the site is still not determined, according to Paul Heuer, vice president of development for Laurent Development in Shakopee. “We’ve contemplated conservation easements but we haven’t taken that step,” Heuer says.

Another very large development, Spirit of Brandtjen Farm in Lakeville, took another route to protect natural areas. This 550-acre site will eventually have 2,109 housing units and 150,000 square feet of mixed-use space. The developer, Tradition Development of Edina, sold a twelve-acre old-growth woodland that lines the lakeshore slope for a steep discount to the City of Lakeville so that it could be preserved through an easement and added to the adjacent forty acres of parkland now being restored. “This lakeshore has an extremely high public value,” says Rob Wachholz of Tradition Development.

Protecting Water & Treading Lightly
A second major principle of conservation development is the use of  living ecological systems for storm water infiltration and purification. Portico on the Green uses a series of rain gardens, also called vegetative swales, to clean storm water runoff before it enters the soil. “The system helps control phosphorus and other pollutants so they don’t get into the wetlands,” says Waters, adding that all runoff will be kept from entering the property’s rare sedge meadow.

Each development has conservation concerns that are specific to its site. The Cannon Bluffs development, for example, uses such vegetative swales to not only cleanse runoff but also prevent erosion of the riverbanks. Credit River Territory has protected the Credit River and one of its tributaries through the use of treatment ponds and swales. Inspiration uses a series of linked landscape elements, including swales, prairies, and wetlands, that treat runoff naturally as it runs through the property.

To protect the 143-acre Cable Lake, Tamarack Point is going against the grain by setting its closest cottage to the lake 200 feet back from the lakeshore edge rather than right near the shoreline, and it is using a holding septic system, which differs from a traditional or mound septic system in that the waste is actually picked up and periodically taken to a treatment plant. “We like the holding tank concept because there will be nothing in the soil,” Burg says.

When placing Tamarack Point cottages, Burg’s group used selective cutting and kept the foundation size of each home small, at 1,600 to 2,500 square feet. “Less is more,” says Burg, since smaller means that more land is left as wilderness. As a way to preserve natural areas, Lino Lakes’ Foxborough development reduced its average lot size and the street right-of-ways to 50 feet, rather than the typical 60 feet. “The homes, which all back up to protected natural areas, are closer to the street, which uses less land,” says Black.

Healthy for All
While not a traditional element of conservation building, healthy homes are good for both human health and the health of the environment. The Diamond Lake Woods development is the first American Lung Association Health House neighborhood in the Midwest. Built by Christian Builders, this neighborhood is only the third in the United States to meet ALA’s strict requirements for indoor air quality. During the building process, independent inspectors perform site inspections and testing is also done upon completion of each home. “Everything is tested to be sure that what you tell the homeowner is done has been done, and if problems are found, corrections are made,” says Brad Richardson, president of Christian Builders. “The filtration systems that ALA requires clean the air substantially better than other systems.”

Richardson’s crew also does everything it can to prevent radon from getting into the home. “Plus we put a mitigation system in if radon were ever to get in,” he says. “And every home we do is an Energy Star home,” a designation given by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Homes that meet the criteria are at least 30 percent more energy efficient than homes built according to the 1993 national Model Energy Code, or 15 percent more efficient than state energy code, whichever is more rigorous. “We’re trying to be a proactive builder. The public is going to demand something that is better than average, something that is healthier,” says Richardson. “And I sleep better at night knowing I have air exchange and filter systems. It’s the right thing to do.”

Green building
Green building practices, while also not a requirement of conservation developments, help protect the environment on a broader scale, and aspects of the green building movement are frequently seen in these developments. “Green building materials still cost a little more than conventional materials,” says Dahl. “So you have to be leaning heavily in the direction of the conservation development movement to consider green building materials and practices.” When completed, many homes in these developments will likely incorporate green building features in their design.

The wood floor of Inspiration’s nature center, for instance, is recycled wood shelving from the former Montgomery Ward store in St. Paul’s Midway neighborhood. Other green features of the building include carpeting made from recycled pop bottles, concrete sinks and flooring, and low-VOC paints.

In Portico on the Green, Waters is installing shared driveways to cut down on hard surfaces. And one home in the Cannon Bluffs development is a total concrete house, says Ingles, which substantially reduces energy costs.

Open Space
High-density building and smaller lots are key to preserving natural landscapes, habitats, and recreational open space, says Wachholz, whose Spirit of Brandtjen Farm development preserves one-third of the development’s acreage in open land, mostly recreational space that includes parkland and a lake, while still managing to support 2,109 housing units. “More efficient and smart use of the land provides for more open space,” he says. “The ultimate number of units in the Spirit development is capped, so the more efficient we are, the more open space we preserve.” The Spirit development will eventually connect with the company’s Cobblestone Lake development to create an experience similar to the Minneapolis Chain of Lakes trail system.

While all of the developments have some type of trail system, fun plays a prominent role in Tamarack Point, but with an environmental twist. “This property is for people who like to cross country ski, bike, hike, watch birds, and connect with nature,” says Burg. Tamarack has two saunas, and in an added effort to retain the wilderness experience and protect wildlife habitat, including undisturbed shoreline for nesting loons, Tamarack’s association prohibits owners from using jet skis on the lake and all-terrain vehicles on the property.

Such concerted efforts among homebuyers, developers, and local communities to preserve the area’s remaining natural landscapes help ensure that Minnesota’s precious natural resources are available for future generations to enjoy.