Amazing. Just amazing.
Following the Paradise Valley Planning Commission’s rejection of a plan to supersize the unremarkable Cottonwoods Hotel in town, backers are now saying they can magically reduce the rejected plan’s proposed density by thirty five percent.
It’s amazing what can happen when you just say no. We opined about the flawed Cottonwoods proposal back in October. Here is a link.
And it makes you wonder, a lot, about the need and premise of the proposal in the first place. There’s little doubt the property needs a little lipstick. But that’s not what this proposal was about. It was nothing more than a denizens of density enrichment plan that would have been good for one pocket book but not good for the character of a town that needs protection more than enhancement.
Paradise Valley is different in that regard. It already is a distinct, impressive community.
Recent defeats of an intensive senior-care facility and the initial disregard for the Cottonwoods plan should be a warning to the backers of a Ritz-Carlton hotel and residential community who are rumored to be cooking up their own plans on steroids.
Mayor Scott Lemarr and the Paradise Valley Town Council already have an easy template for what can and should be done when it comes to resort redevelopment, of which the town is blessed to have many. Mountain Shadows should not be part of that discussion because of the unique legal circumstances of the case. But Sanctuary, Hermosa Inn, Montelucia and the initial Ritz plan should. The first two of these properties added little density as they transformed their properties into a better place. Montelucia and the Ritz did propose more aggressive densities but the latter was upheld in a public vote by a 2-1 margin.
So there’s the menu. There’s the delta. There’s the template. Going beyond would take something extraordinary. These Cottonwoods, even in spring time, don’t offer such.
Inertia and effort are not an excuse for eventual approval. Merit is. And their plan still lacks it.