The largest housing development since Harbor Square is expected to break ground on the north end of Winslow by the middle of next year.

Planned for the eight acres to the west of the Pavilion, the 138-unit Grow Community aims to be a walkable, energy-efficient neighborhood with a mix of housing types.

“We’re hoping to create a community that doesn’t yet exist,” said Marja Preston, a planner for Asani, the company that’s developing the site. “The idea is to create opportunities for more community interaction through diverse housing and amenities on the site.”

Grow Community’s preliminary site plan calls for condominiums, townhouses, rental apartments and single-family homes set along a wide central trail. Asani plans to incorporate pea-patches, composting areas, rain gardens and a community hall.

Read my story HERE.

Asani’s preliminary site plan can be seen below.

Back when she was a Bainbridge city planner, Preston worked to get the site listed as pilot project with Forest Trends’ Business and Biodiversity Offset Program, which aims to strike a balance between large-scale resource use and environmental preservation.

In a story I wrote for the Review in 2007, the plan was generally panned by other conservationists who were brought to Bainbridge for a Forest Trends conference. The project site was seen as too small to have a significant impact, said conservationists who were leading biodiversity offset projects in Africa that benefit endangered animals and fragile forests.

Though smaller in scale, the project shouldn’t be discounted, a South African scientist said.

Don’t call it a biodiversity offset, he said. Call it sound urban planning.

It looks like that’s what Preston is aiming for, albeit now through the private sector rather than City Hall.

Grow Community Map

Looks like the last remnants of the Hoskinson homestead are coming down. Read my story here about the city’s recent decision to allow the removal of large trees planted by Winslow’s earliest settlers.

If you didn’t catch Becky Fox Marshall’s latest column in the Islander, read it below. This week, Marshall warns that the island’s recent population growth slowdown doesn’t mean growth has halted, nor does it mean we should stop planning for growth.

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A recent social and health services survey ranks affordable housing as the biggest problem on Bainbridge Island.

Polling various service providers and over 600 residents, the Bainbridge Health, Housing and Human Services Council found that the issue of affordable housing – for buyers, renters and seniors needing special care – had the largest gap between the perceived need and the community’s perceived ability to meet that need. For more information on the housing portion of the survey, read my story by clicking here.

Housing, while identified as the biggest problem, was only part of what the survey had to say.

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The brisk pace of Bainbridge Island’s population growth slowed to a crawl this year, casting doubt on projections steering current city planning.

According to state demographers, Bainbridge’s estimated growth hit an eight-year low in 2008, dropping from an average of about 2 percent to less than 0.5 percent.

The slow rise means the island will add only 100 people in 2008, putting the total population at about 23,180.

“This is interesting because so much of Bainbridge politics is based on the prediction that growth is out of control,” said Tim Bailey, an island real estate agent and chair of the city’s 2025 Growth Advisory Committee. “As a resident, I’d say this could be welcome news because it will make it easier to plan and give us time to react.”

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