Mr. Rothman presented his latest thinking at the Jan. 21 Fairfax Planning Commission meeting.  A summary is provided below, and two maps are included at the bottom of this post.

View a recording of the entire meeting here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYEqCnRE8i0.  The discussion starts around 0:14:30 and ends at 2:10:00.

His proposal included a development option as well as a buyout option for a non-development Open Space type organization.  This meeting focused primarily on the 84 acre area surrounding the Marinda Fire Road. Here is a brief summary of what was said:

Option 1 (shown on maps below) would involve:

• One house on the ~16 acre Ridgeway lot.  This house would be in the flat area above St. Rita’s / Fairfax Market, set back out of sight lines.  Access would be via Ridgeway.  There are still some questions as to the details of this access that Mr. Rothman is discussing with the town.  More information is forthcoming.
• One house on the small lot off Marinda Drive (zoned the same as the rest of the neighborhood as Upland Residential 7.5).  Access would be via a driveway coming off what is currently the Marinda Fire Road (which is on Rothman’s property).
• Eight 10-acre lots with 1 house each (all “in-law” units have been removed from the proposal) on the 84 acre area along the current Marinda Fire Road (see map below).  These houses would all be on 10 acre lots, but the building envelope would be small and defined on the existing ‘pad’ areas.  The rest of each 10 acre lot would be green-belted meaning that nothing else (including fences) could be developed; and that greenbelting provision would “run with the land” whenever the properties were sold.  According to Mr. Rothman, this would in effect preserve open space for over 90% of each lot in perpetuity.
• The last (highest) house along the fire road would be on the 2nd pad below the stone spiral / labyrinth / spirit circle.  A road would be paved up to the last house for access and would stop there.  Beyond that it would stay as the existing trail that heads uphill past the spiral and up to the saddle where San Anselmo open space begins.
• The remaining 4 acres would be donated to open space for the creation of a trail.  One part of this trail would run parallel to the current Marinda Fire Road (which will be paved to provide access to the houses being built) but ideally will be built far enough from the road to feel secluded.  In addition, a newly created trail would climb from the right side of Marinda Drive through wooded areas of the property, eventually meeting up with the existing trail on the Ridgeway property (see map) connecting to the Open Space area where Fairfax meets San Anselmo on the ridge, which eventually drops down the existing trail toward the stone spiral / labyrinth, thus creating a loop.

Option 2 is a buyout option for the 84 acres for $3 million.  Mr. Rothman has offered this as an option only to non-developers (for example, if a Marin or other Open Space organization wanted to purchase and preserve the land).

Two maps are linked below.  If you open or download the PDFs, you can zoom in to better see street names and landmarks.

Map 1:  

prelim-8-lot-layout-1-21-16-greenbelt-version-3

This topographical map shows the 8 lots as well as the building envelope for each home (in blue) and greenbelted areas (in green).  It also shows the proposed Open Space loop trail area (in red).  Please note that you may need to download the file to see the color overlay.  To download, right click the link below and click ‘download’ or a similar command, depending on your browser.

Map 2:

marin-map-2-3

This is a satellite “Marin Map” that shows the surrounding area and the potential building sites.

No formal proposal has been submitted, but these maps represent Mr. Rothman’s latest thinking.  Studies are required to address concerns with landslides, wildlife, and other impacts, and we’ll keep an eye on those.  Another workshop to discuss updates will likely be held in the March timeframe.    We will post details when we have them.  Thanks for keeping up with this process and please sign up on the email list for updates.