Kyle Canyon development plan draws fire despite revisions

The wide-open desert at the intersection of Kyle Canyon Road and U.S. Highway 95 would be home to as many as 9,000 houses, retail properties and a casino under a revised development agreement between the landowners and the city of Las Vegas.

It's a scaled-back version of an earlier plan that included up to 16,000 houses and five-story condominium buildings, a proposal that evaporated when the economy unraveled in the fall of 2008.

The revised plan, however, still faces criticism from residents who say it's too much building on nearly 1,700 acres of property that borders the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area and serves as a buffer between urban Las Vegas and the rustic communities in the Mount Charleston area.

"That is not what people want in their neighborhoods," said Tom Padden, 56, a lifelong resident of Mount Charleston. "If they want to be close to hotels and casinos, they can live in a part of the city that is close to that."

The proposal, called the Kyle Canyon Gateway project, will be the subject of a community meeting Tuesday at the Centennial Hills YMCA and is expected to go before the Planning Commission Sept. 13.

Although the landowners are seeking approval for a major development, they expect it will be years before any construction takes place given the moribund state of the local economy and lack of demand for new housing.

Still, if approved, the plan is good for 20 years and represents the future of some of the last undeveloped land in the city.

Mike Ross, senior director at Carwin Advisors, a consultant to landowners KAG Property, LLC., said the revised development plan is a more responsible vision for the area than the previous proposal by Focus Property Group before the land was foreclosed on by Wachovia bank in September 2008.

"This plan in today's market is not economically viable," said Ross, pointing to the Focus proposal. The KAG plan "is a whole heck of a lot less," he said.

In addition to proposing 46 percent fewer homes, the revised plan calls for the developer to build a floodwater detention basin that would reduce flooding that occurs near the existing Bilbray and Scherkenbach elementary schools.

The plan also includes a contribution of
$4.1 million to the construction of a fire station to serve new and existing developments and a contribution to the construction of a police substation and would spend about $2 million toward construction of a new interchange at Kyle Canyon Road and U.S. 95.

The plan also includes 75 acres to be donated for new elementary, middle and high schools, six parks and trails for waking, riding and equestrian use.

Whether the changes will be enough to appease critics remains to be seen.

Todd Schwartz, president of the Spring Mountain Ranch homeowners association, said the current proposal is better than the original idea he opposed in 2007.

But he's still concerned about the proposed casino and the placement of multifamily residential and commercial structures near elementary schools.

"My biggest issue with a casino more than anything is it is a cop-out to finding a better way to diversify this valley's economic base," Schwartz said. "Why can't we be more creative? That's why we're in the rut we're in."

Ross said the casino stayed in the proposal because gambling is already an approved use on the site. And he blamed the proximity of proposed commercial property to the schools on earlier decisions to build schools near what is now the interchange of Horse Drive and U.S. 95, as opposed to putting them farther from the highway.

"It can be made to work, but it is not the best," Ross said of the proposed layout.

Flinn Fagg, director of the city's planning department, said the vision for Kyle Canyon Gateway dates to 2004 when the city held planning meetings for residents before the Bureau of Land Management auction that put the property into private hands.

Fagg said that the city would have no problem with less dense development, as some residents have suggested but that the developer is holding the cards.

"It is the developer who gets to put forward what they can develop and what they can do successfully," Fagg said. "There are market factors that determine exactly what the land use might be."

Contact reporter Benjamin Spillman at bspillman@ reviewjournal.com or 702-229-6435.