Treasure Coast can have New Urban developments without affordable housing, but should we?

When Joan Jefferson, former mayor of Stuart, and her husband, Peter, moved into the Post Office Arcade building, it represented a major turning point in transforming the city's blighted downtown into an award-winning destination.

The Jeffersons, who purchased the historic building along with Ann and David MacMillan in 1990, demonstrated that living and working in the same place was not only feasible, but fun.

More than three decades later, the concept of living close to where you work, shop and play remains one of the guiding principles of the New Urbanism style of development.

And it seems with a couple of high-profile projects planned for Martin County, New Urbanism might be coming into fashion on the Treasure Coast.

New Urbanism has distinct advantages

I recently wrote about Newfield, a community planned for 3,411 acres near the Palm City-Port St. Lucie border. The project is the brainchild of business media executive Knight Kiplinger, although he prefers the term "traditional neighborhood design" to "New Urbanism."

In addition to generous amounts of recreational space, Newfield is expected at build-out to include about 4,200 homes, clustered around a town center with shops, restaurants and other institutional buildings.

If everything stays on schedule, the first 180 homes and 10,000 to 15,000 square feet of commercial space are expected to be available for sale or lease next fall. That will include townhomes, priced in the low $400,000s, and single-family homes, priced around $700,000 to $800,000.

Meanwhile, a project known as Storie FL is working its way through the county's application review process. It's expected to include about 4,000 residential units on 2,700 acres near Hobe Sound, with a town center and amenities that include a charter school, fire station and numerous recreational facilities.

Storie FL may be a year or so away from final approval, but a representative from the advertising company that's been handling the project's publicity said the housing units would include a mix of apartments, townhomes and single-family residences.

Pricing key to selling any product

Conceptually, I'm not against either of these projects. If we're going to have development on the Treasure Coast, it seems sensible to me to try to cluster it into "self-contained" micro-communities like Newfield or Storie FL.

That type of configuration should make it easier for governments to provide services to the residents. At least in theory, it could also reduce the number of car trips if residents are able to take care of many of their shopping needs within those town centers.

So, yes, I'm actually hoping New Urbanism, or whatever developers want to call it, catches on not only in Martin County, but elsewhere along the Treasure Coast.

St. Lucie County has designated a portion of its western lands with a land-use called "towns, villages and countryside," which could be ripe for these types of projects if county officials don't give in to developers who may wish to change the rules to allow more conventional types of development there.

Don't count on ultra-rich to 'live small'

Here's my caveat: These new projects should include at least some affordable housing.

Based on what I've heard so far, I'm not sure that's going to happen with Newfield. After convincing the Martin County Commission to approve the design plans, Kiplinger essentially handed off responsibility for building Newfield to Mattamy Homes, the project's master developer.

In an email exchange, Kiplinger told me his vision for Newfield was one where young families, older people downsizing from larger homes and people working public sector jobs, like teachers and firefighters, would be able to afford to live there.

"When I first proposed Newfield almost seven years ago, Florida and Martin County were very different housing markets, with median home prices much lower than today," Kiplinger wrote. " ... I spoke of Newfield having a broader mix of home types, sizes and prices than the large-lot, gated golf course communities that dominated the county market at that time, in which every large new home was priced similarly (high) within a given neighborhood."

However, James FitzGerald, Mattamy's senior manager of community development and planning, initially told me there are no plans for affordable units within the development.

"At this time, everything is expected to be market rate," FitzGerald said in a separate email exchange. "We do believe that the diversity in product offering as it relates to home sizes, styles and price points will attract a diverse cohort of new homebuyers."

Then, in a subsequent emailed statement, FitzGerald said: "We're closely attuned to the current market pressures on consumers and are actively looking into ways to bring housing to Newfield that will make homeownership more attainable, particularly for people in noble professions such as teaching, health care and law enforcement, for example,"

Read into that what you will. But if townhome prices are starting at $400,000, I'm guessing most of the employees who work in Newfield's shops and restaurants aren't going to be able to afford to live in the community.

Which means they will have to commute from somewhere else. Which means whatever reduction in car trips there might be from having Newfield residents shopping close by will be offset to some degree by the commuting workers.

Generally, housing is considered to be affordable if rent or mortgage payments (including taxes and insurance) amount to 30% or less of the community's median income.

Marketing can save or doom this concept

I'm hopeful, but not overly optimistic, some of the housing within Storie FL will meet that benchmark. Mason Hutchinson, an account manager for the Cotton & Co. advertising firm, said no final decisions about pricing for Storie FL are available yet.

I understand developers have business plans to follow, and they have certain expectations about how much profit they want to make. Unless they start thinking about affordable housing early in the planning stages of these projects, it's not likely to be included.

New Urbanism is a lifestyle concept that can work. There are people who like the idea of living close to their neighbors and sharing shopping and recreational areas. Take it from a guy who has lived in one of those communities.

But it's not going to appeal to everybody. I don't think real estate agents are going to convince people who can afford million-dollar mansions on multi-acre lots that they really should be living in apartments above shops or small cottages with postage-stamp lawns instead.

Rather than trying to sell New Urbanism as boutique products for the ultra-rich, the real market for it is with younger, middle-class consumers. If they try the lifestyle and like it, then they might be more inclined to stick with it after they've fattened up their bank accounts later in life.

I'd hate to see a great idea fail because it was pitched to the wrong group of people.

This column reflects the opinion of Blake Fontenay. Contact him via email at blake.fontenay@tcpalm.com or at 772-232-5424.

This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Don't miss opportunity to include affordable housing in New Urbanism