(Rendering via Town of Gilbert)
By Cecilia Chan | Gilbert Sun News
Liane Reid remembered growing up in Gilbert when there was just one streetlight in the entire town.
“We could ride our horses into Jim’s Dairy Bar and hitch up out back and get ice cream,” said Reid, who lives on a piece of unincorporated county island near Knox Road and Val Vista Drive in Gilbert.
Over time, she’s seen urban growth chew away at the town’s agricultural roots and now a newly proposed annexation of land for the development of rental housing is looming.
“I really feel that it’s going to have a strong impact on my quality of life as well as my family’s,” Reid said at the Aug. 23 Council meeting. “Everything in the city life is encroaching.
“I moved there so that I could have my farm animals and you know my distance between my neighbors. Now, without any choice of mine, I’m getting an overwhelming amount of neighbors piled on top of me if this goes through.”
New Village Homes is proposing to build Highland Park, a gated community of 72 townhomes and 66 cottages for rent on 16.2 acres near the southeast corner of Val Vista Drive and Warner Road.
