Orton Junction

Orton Junction:
Impacts On the Puyallup Valley

by Maxine Herbert-Hill

RURAL NEIGHBORHOOD

Surrounding neighborhoods will loose key characteristics of rural area.

With urban development comes traffic, noise and night time light. These are contaminants to a rural area. There has been no discussion of this at all. The best they could do is plant some tall poplar trees and other dense trees and shrubs to help screen the light. It will still filter through and you can’t do much of anything about the contamination of the night sky. A rural area is dark and quiet at night. How are they going to protect the character of the adjacent rural area? In due time, it will be determined that this does not have the character of a rural area and will claim that it is developable because of it. And so it will go. The “green wall” as they call it, will be neither green nor a wall. SR410 was an effective wall to divide the urban area from the rural and farming region. There is nothing they can create that will be as strong a divider as that highway.

Traffic will compromise safety for those who live in the rural area. We have no idea if or how the developers will change Riverside Drive or 166th beyond the confines of the development. The projected volume of traffic will suggest sidewalks would be necessary for public safety – if anyone thinks that’s important. However, sidewalks themselves are an urban characteristic, not rural. (This was discussed at some length in the Community Planning process.) It is my prediction that no sidewalks will be put in, the “rural” community will rightfully demand something to protect their safety and then be taxed to put them in, out of necessity and poor planning. There needs to be some kind of $1 million escrow account or something that the developers must provide for such eventualities, held in trust for at least 10 years after the full build out.

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