Warehouses won't rise next to retirement community
It appears the Inland Empire warehouse boom won't be moving next door to Westmont Village.
The president of the company that owns the Riverside-area retirement community said Tuesday he is shelving plans to build warehouses on vacant land next to Westmont, a proposal that faced strong opposition from Westmont residents.
Instead, Andy Plant of the La Jolla-based Westmont Living said he's looking into developing homes on the land.
“We're long-term committed to Westmont Village and we don't want to create any long-term issues that are going to negatively affect the community,” Plant said in a phone interview. “At the same time, we're trying to figure out how the land can be utilized. At this point, it seems the path forward is residential.
“We genuinely listened to the residents and that's a big driver in our decision.”
Plant sent a letter announcing his change of plans to Westmont residents. Christina Miller, who lives at Westmont, said that while she was “cautiously optimistic” about Plant’s comments, “I am not celebrating yet.”
Miller remains concerned that warehouses could still be built next door.
“I’m kind of happy that this happened,” she said. “But I’m also not really convinced.”
Formerly known as Air Force Village West, Westmont occupies land that used to be part of March Air Force Base before it downsized to an air reserve base in the 1990s.
Plant’s company wanted the March Joint Powers Authority, the public agency with land-use authority over the ex-military property, to rezone vacant land to the west and south of Westmont for industrial use. Plans called for a 1 million-square-foot warehouse and three other logistics buildings ranging in size from 43,332 square feet to 83,551 square feet.
Westmont residents worried the warehouses would bring toxic fumes from diesel trucks and ruin their quality of life with noise and light
The owner of Westmont Village, a Riverside-area senior retirement community, is scrapping plans to built warehouses next door. Instead, the vacant land is to be the site of future housing. pollution.
“Health effects aside — the noise, the lights — I definitely don’t see how I or the others on that street … would be able to peacefully exist here,” Westmont resident Jo Crosbie said in February.
The land is near the Ben
Clark Training Center, which trains law enforcement personnel. Plant said he pursued an industrial development after hearing officials’ concerns that building homes near the center would lead to noise complaints.
Amazon and UPS facilities are near the land, Plant said.
“From my perspective, it would have been logical to do residential or industrial,” he said, because the land represents a transition area between homes and warehouses.
Plant said he met with residents and heard their opposition to logistics. He said that after getting feedback from Riverside County Supervisor Kevin Jeffries’ office — who represents Westmont and sits on the March JPA board — and the Ben Clark center, he now plans to build homes on the land with a berm separating them from the training center to address the noise.
Plant said he’s not sure how many homes will be built on the land or whether they’ll be age restricted like homes in Westmont. He added it will take his civil engineering firm six to nine months to assess the homes’ environmental impact, with construction at least a year away.
Miller said that if housing is built, she hopes it’s restricted to those 55 and older.
“If (Plant) just expands
Westmont Village … that would be great,” she said.
While it appears warehouses won’t be Westmont’s neighbors, logistics looms large in the area around the 215 Freeway and March Air Reserve Base, driven by strong e-commerce demand; cheap, flat and vacant land suitable for warehouses; easy access to interstates and rail lines; and the Inland Empire’s proximity to the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.
More than 1.8 million square feet of warehouse space — roughly 32 football fields — is planned for vacant land near Riverside’s Orangecrest and Mission Grove neighborhoods not far from Westmont. Sandwiched between the 215 and the air base, a 1.9 million-square-foot Target distribution center is being built.
While warehouses employ thousands and anchor the Inland economy, critics contend it’s not worth the air pollution, truck traffic and other ills associated with warehouses, which are moving closer to homes and schools.
Logistics complexes are also sought for sites near senior communities in Banning and Beaumont as demand for warehouse space pushes new logistics projects into the San Gorgonio Pass and desert.