Creekside Park development raises concern over village aesthetic

Burton said the petitioners feel like a victim of a bait-and-switch technique because of the clear-cutting of the trees in Creekside Park.

"I could have bought my same house for $100,000 less just south of The Woodlands, but I decided to pay a premium to live within the township because I loved that idea of living in a forested environment," he said.

One plot of land between the bifurcated Kuykendahl Road, between the The Woodlands Fire Station No. 7 and the H-E-B in the Creekside Park Village Center, has no trees left after clear-cutting. The area, about the size of a city block, was once populated with mature trees. The site was selected to be a part of the Creekside Park Village Center development. Burton said the parcel of land was the catalyst for residents' concern because of the stark contrast in what was once wooded and is now a large square of dirt.

Vice President of Planning for The Woodlands Development Company Robert Heineman said all of the trees were cut on the tract because the Development Company discovered it had a bowl-like surface. He said for the property to properly drain and for the buildings to be elevated correctly, the project's contractor used 300 truckloads of dirt on the surface to correct the grade. The property will eventually accommodate medical offices, restaurants and retail. Heineman said construction begins this month, with buildings first, parking and then landscaping.

The Woodlands Township Chairman Bruce Tough said trees have been cleared in the Creekside Park Village Center because it will resemble Market Street.

"[The development] has roadways going through it like Market Street, and the drainage accommodations could not be met, and [the Development Company] cleared the trees," he said. "And it's alarming and unsettling. But the assurances and promises have been made—there will be a lot of re-vegetation and planting within the development plans."

Co-president of The Woodlands Development Company Alex Sutton said one of the inspirations for the Creekside Park Village Center was the Mayberry community depicted in "The Andy Griffith Show."

Heineman said the Development Company has aimed to preserve the natural environment of Creekside Park by replanting trees and by leaving a forested buffer around the village center.

"We had always wanted to build this village square [similar to what] you see all over Texas in small towns," Heineman said. "We don't have a village green in any of the villages."

He said the Development Company wanted to improve from the village centers it has built in the past.

"We put all of those ideas together—and we came up with this idea—based on being innovative and evolving and learning from our mistakes," he said. "We believe they are better ideas."

He said the center would be bicycle and pedestrian friendly.

Sutton said, "The idea is to be able to create the village center so that you don't have to use a car."

Burton said there is a larger issue of clear-cutting trees in Creekside Park in areas other than the village center being developed.

"The Woodlands Development Company sold us The Woodlands, but they are now building us Katy," Burton said.

He said the Development Company told him, when he was a prospective homebuyer, that commercial development would be hidden behind natural forest buffers.

"[Creekside Park is] not going to look like Katy," Sutton said. "Because we do have the [vegetation] preserves, we have the trees, and we are landscaping in a formal manner."

Heineman said Hughes Landing is a good representation of a formal manner of landscaping with its fusion of vegetation, multi-family properties and retail.

Burton said the petition asks the Development Company to ensure Creekside Park is consistent with the look of the rest of The Woodlands.

"You can have a wonderful walkable, bikeable neighborhood towered over by beautiful trees," he said. "The bike paths in the original Woodlands designs serve this purpose directly. As we say in our petition, we are not anti-development—we simply want development done consistent with the original villages of The Woodlands. This is a reasonable expectation of reasonable people who believed what they were sold by the Development Company when we moved in."

Heineman said the Village of Creekside Park, with the exception of the Creekside Park Village Center, is being developed with the same forest preserve standards as other villages in The Woodlands.

"There are some areas where we have bought property that were outside The Woodlands since we began Creekside Park, and a lot of that had no trees on it," Heineman said. "We've always had a requirement in front yards for 40 percent of the front yard area to be preserved as a natural area—not grass—and that's been in the standards for a long time."

Heineman said the Development Company has recently enacted standards that require 25 percent of homes' backyards to be "a natural wooded setting or replanted."

Township director Peggy Hausman said homebuyers have a perception of what The Woodlands is when they drive around the villages—that all of villages in The Woodlands would look similar, which includes the forest aesthetic. She said in the past, Woodlands developers have protected the trees.

"I think that historically they've always worked around the mature trees," Hausman said. "It's hard to protect Mother Nature. And it's expensive to protect to Mother Nature. But I do think that it's worth it."