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Pasco County residential development undergoing revival

By CHUIN-WEI YAP
Published December 21, 2006

DARBY - Out with the old, in with the ... old.

The owners of a former ranch in Darby are dusting off their construction plans, made in 2004 but never developed, to build a 967-acre high-end residential community east of Bellamy Brothers Boulevard and north of St. Joe Road.

Avalon Investment Corp. of Spring Hill bought the Pasco County property for $6.3-million in 2004 and first laid out its development plan that year, but it never moved forward with it.

Now, despite the slump in the housing market, preliminary plans to revive the project have landed in county offices.

Avalon has to update the development conditions governing things such as road work and environmental controls if it wants to proceed with the project.

The property's zoning limits it to large lots only, so the plan currently filed with the county calls for 137 homes, each one sitting on 5- or 10-acre tracts.

No commercial component is proposed.

The property was considered for development through the late 1990s. In 1996, county commissioners first approved a zoning change to allow the development. The dimensions remain largely unchanged in its most recent version.

But the plan then was to have mobile homes on it, which drew fire from neighbors. This time, Avalon is thinking high-end single-family homes.

Tentatively called Saran Ranch, after its former incarnation, the proposed development is about 3 miles north of State Road 52 and a mile west of Interstate 75.

Jerry Harris of Avalon did not return a call for comment Wednesday.

[Last modified December 20, 2006, 21:34:55]