Silo Ridge . Com

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New York Sky of Blue, Pastoral Sea of Green By Tarez Eisen 10/1/2009 Luxury living in a land of abundant wildlife and valleys, just 85 miles north of the bustle of Manhattan? It seems too good to be true, until you hear of Silo Ridge, a sustainable residential and resort development incorporated in Amenia, a sleepy hamlet of 4,000 in Northeast Dutchess County’s Harlem Valley. Touted as a “healthy-living lifestyle” community and resort, Silo Ridge is essentially the first of its kind to integrate sustainable expansion in a natural environment in the New York metropolitan area. Planned by Millbrook Ventures, LLC, the development firm created by Stephen Garofalo in 2000 to develop a resort and residential neighborhood on the existing 670-acre golf course, Silo Ridge will include a 300-unit hotel and four residential areas consisting of 338 townhome and golf villa condos, vineyard cottages, and 41 single-family homes to be built in three phases. “We’ve been pretty consistent to the vision, of creating a little village with a hotel, the golf clubhouse, maybe a few little shops and buildings close together like you’d find in a New England village, around a green. And then neighborhoods stretching out, shall we say, extending like fingers into the more open country,” says Robert A.M. Stern, the lead architect on the project. “And that’s been the idea all along.” Maintaining 80 percent open space, nearly 537 acres, ensures that the development will be of relatively low impact to the surrounding environment. Approximately 64 percent of the development’s units are within a quarter mile of the resort core and less than 6 percent of the development will be impervious road surface. Developers hope some of the storm water runoff from these surfaces will be recycled into potable water for the resort and golf course. Millbrook Ventures will also seek evaluation from New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and will then move forward in planning for energy efficient heating and lighting. NYSERDA, according to Millbrook Ventures Vice President of Construction Mike Dignacco, will evaluate Silo Ridge’s resources and topography and will then create the optimum energy plan for Silo Ridge. “I think the whole process has worked very well. Environmentally, we’ve brought the town to a whole other level,” says Bill Flood, Town of Amenia planning board chairman. “We’ve set the bar very high at this point.” For now, Silo Ridge, having already gained approval of its master development plan through the special use permit process, awaits site plan and subdivision approval that developers and town board members hope will come before the projected construction start date of spring 2010. It is hoped that by 2012, phase one—the hotel, golf course, retail space, spa, and several homes—will be completed. Silo Ridge is a unique development that Stern says speaks to travelers in the area and local residents. Stern, who has a broad knowledge and deep respect for the area, is designing the resort and residential neighborhood to blend with the natural landscape. It will be “visually suitable” and “fundamentally green,” he says.

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