Laurel Hill Valley Citizens want to live near the center of the Eugene-Springfield area while preserving a rural character.

But a neighborhood cannot indefinitely expect the benefits of an urban location while resisting the housing, infrastructure and transportation investments that make urban life possible. As Eugene grows, Laurel Hill Valley must be part of that growth.

The infrastructure arguments Laurel Hill Valley Citizens use to oppose DevNW’s housing project are not inevitable; they are a result of the neighborhood association’s 52 years of resisting development and change. Those exclusionary decisions are unsustainable, and should not permanently prevent the neighborhood from evolving to meet our need for more affordable housing.

This history begins with the 1974 Laurel Hill Plan, revised in 1982, which remains an adopted plan of the city of Eugene. I highly recommend reading it to understand its views on the “evils of the grid-type tract housing and street layout” that much of the rest of Eugene uses.

The plan reflects a vision of neighborhood design that prioritizes preserving rural character over urban development, with consequences that the rest of Eugene should not have to accommodate indefinitely.

The neighborhood association argues that the roads are too narrow to accommodate these new affordable homes. The roads are this way because of the plan’s emphasis on preserving a rural character, calling for the exact “single lane, one-way streets” they now present as an insurmountable barrier to new housing.

The plan also describes sidewalks as “unimaginative” and to be “avoided when practicable,” compared with bark or gravel paths. That philosophy has consequences for people who need safe, accessible walking routes. If providing safe sidewalks for people with disabilities and for parents with strollers is unimaginative, I am happy to be considered boring.

Even so, DevNW is willing to address these concerns. They have offered to widen the street to two lanes and build sidewalks that would improve accessibility and safety. Rather than treating existing infrastructure as a permanent barrier to housing, we should ask how development can help improve it.

The neighborhood association also argues that affordable housing should not be built here because of a lack of public transit. The lack of bus service is a legitimate concern, particularly for residents who cannot afford a car or cannot drive. But this creates a catch-22: Low-density development makes frequent bus service too expensive to provide, while the resulting lack of bus service is then used to oppose the denser housing that could help make transit financially viable.

It also overlooks Lane Transit District’s efforts to potentially expand microtransit (like the Cottage Grove Connector) and bike share (PeaceHealth Rides) to neighborhoods like Laurel Hill.

Wildfire is another legitimate concern, especially as climate change increases fire risks. Development can incorporate fire-resistant construction, defensible space and managed landscaping, reducing the wildfire risks compared to the current unmanaged vegetation.

These questions should be evaluated by qualified fire and emergency professionals based on the proposed development itself. Genuine safety concerns should inform how housing is built, not automatically become reasons to prevent it.

I write this as a member of Gen Z, whose life trajectory has been shaped by our housing crisis. Today, the home I was born into in Glendale, California, is 400% more expensive than it was the day I was born in 1999.

All of my friends from high school are either living with their parents, with three or more roommates, or have fled across the country in search of an affordable life. In my four years in Eugene I have fallen love with this community and this place, and like many I want the opportunity to build a stable life in Eugene.

If solving the housing crisis was easy, we would have done it already. Our city needs 26,000 new housing units over the next 20 years, and Eugene cannot afford to keep every neighborhood frozen in time. For my generation to have a chance to build stable lives here, we need to build more housing.

Across Eugene, neighborhoods are doing their part by making room for new homes:

Each neighborhood has its own needs and challenges, but no neighborhood should be exempt from contributing to the city’s future.

We can preserve many of the things people value about a neighborhood while improving its streets, making it more accessible and creating homes for the next generation to live in. But that requires recognizing that a neighborhood is part of a city, and that a city’s future cannot be determined solely by the people who already own homes.

It is time for Laurel Hill Valley to do its part.

Peter Simmeth is a Eugene resident who cares about sustainable communities, urban design, and the outdoors. His background spans community and regional planning, education, and biochemistry.