A proposal to build homes and a manufacturing expansion on roughly 50 acres of vacant farmland at State Highway 16 and Chinden Boulevard has Prescott Ridge neighbors bracing for a fight, with Meridian City Council set to weigh in Tuesday night after planning and zoning commissioners already recommended rejecting it. The Singing Woods Subdivision would sit in unincorporated Ada County and combine roughly 60 residential lots, one commercial lot and nine common lots with space for Franklin Sensors, a local manufacturer looking to grow.
According to the Idaho Statesman, Meridian planning and zoning commissioners cited concerns about density and traffic when they recommended in October that the City Council deny the project. The newspaper also reported that the proposal includes 61 single-family units, a count that appears elsewhere in coverage as about 60 residential lots alongside one commercial lot and nine common lots — a discrepancy the available reporting does not resolve. Franklin Sensors founder David Dorrough said his company needs the space because its current facility north of Chinden Boulevard has run out of room. “We’re growing, and we’re out of space,” Dorrough said, per the Statesman.
Why Prescott Ridge Residents Are Worried
Prescott Ridge sits east of the proposed development, and neighbors there fear that cut-through traffic could put people and pets at risk. Kayla Geddes, who lives on Fireline Court in Prescott Ridge, said children and pets frequently play on neighborhood streets and that commercial traffic paired with new homes could endanger them. Fireline Court in particular could face cut-through traffic challenges, according to the Statesman’s reporting.
Shelly Cable, another Fireline Court resident, raised concerns about semi-truck traffic near nearby schools, including a K-12 school on McDermott Road. “We knew something was going to be built back there, but not a manufacturing plant,” Cable said. She told the paper she had been informing other residents about the project herself because only some neighbors received official notice. Prescott Ridge residents did receive formal project notice and letters from Dorrough in October, the Statesman reported, and neighbors have also raised concerns about narrow streets — Lost Rapids Lane, Ladle Rapids Street, Parachute Drive and Rustic Oak Way — that they say are unsuitable for heavy commercial use.
Dorrough Pushes Back on Traffic Fears
Dorrough has disputed the traffic concerns, saying his project would not require use of neighborhood streets and that, based on the company’s analysis of where employees live, most workers would actually commute in the opposite direction from Prescott Ridge. He argued the development would generate less traffic than other possible uses of the land, including retail stores or restaurants, while still producing roughly as much traffic as an entirely residential project would. Dorrough also proposed adding more trees to the buffer between residential and commercial lots to address neighbors’ objections.
The Ada County Highway District and the Idaho Transportation Department reviewed Dorrough’s application along with a traffic study and told the Statesman they believe area roads can handle the additional traffic his business would bring. Dorrough said he held three meetings with neighbors specifically to address traffic and safety concerns, a step Meridian city staff required early in the planning process. “We’re happy to work with them. If there are other things that we can do that are reasonable, we’d be happy to listen,” Dorrough said, adding that he is trying to be accommodating to neighbors. He has also warned that if Singing Woods is not approved, another development will likely be built on the site instead.
Schools Already Stretched Thin
The proposal is expected to bring about 30 school-age children into an area where Pleasant View Elementary, Star Middle School and Owyhee High School are already over capacity, the Statesman reported. Those schools keep accepting new students regardless because Idaho public schools cannot turn children away. Michelle Edmonds, a spokesperson for the West Ada School District, confirmed the capacity issues to the paper.
Geddes said her daughter’s fourth-grade class exceeded its maximum enrollment level until the district added another teacher to the class last month. She said her family would not have moved to Prescott Ridge had they known about the development, and said flatly that she does not want it to proceed. Dorrough has countered that new schools are being built across Meridian to accommodate the city’s broader growth. Neighbors and planning and zoning commissioners have additionally flagged concerns about the project’s proposed operating hours, limited green space and the number of commuters the plant could eventually bring.
Part of a Bigger Northwest Meridian Push
Singing Woods is one piece of a much larger wave of development reshaping northwest Meridian. Developers have submitted plans that could bring almost 3,500 homes to the area near the Idaho 16 extension, and a $26 million sewer lift station is in the works to support that growth, according to the Statesman’s separate reporting on the broader corridor. Toll Brothers already won city approval in July for a nearby project with nearly 700 homes, including 71 town homes, plus 60,000 square feet of commercial space.
A separate 27-acre mixed-use proposal called Chinden16, reported by BoiseDev, would bring 66 single-family homes, a 120,000-square-foot light-industrial building and 55,000 square feet of office and retail space to the intersection of Chinden Boulevard and McDermott Road. That project remains in an early stage and still needs council approval of annexation and rezoning before it can move forward. BoiseDev separately reported that Franklin Sensors currently employs 90 people and that permit documents indicate that number could double at the new facility, with the development’s only two access points sited at the southern edge of the property where roads lead out of surrounding neighborhoods.
Meridian officials have described northwest Meridian as an area to watch for development, even as they caution that construction west of the Idaho 16 extension may take time to materialize. Trevor Smith, communications manager for the city of Meridian, said neighbor opposition is a common part of the process whenever new developments come up for consideration. For now, the fate of Singing Woods rests with the City Council, which was scheduled to take up the matter Tuesday night.
