LONGMONT-"If you replace the farm , do it with an even trade."

That's the recommendation of Andres Duany, one of the architects for John "Kiki" Wallace's proposed development on his 80 acres at the gateway to Longmont at Pike and Main streets.

The property, currently a tree farm, is bordered by Highway 287. About a year ago Wallace requested that the city of Longmont review his parcel for inclusion in the city's planning area. After planners' approval, Wallace submitted his application for annexation a few weeks ago.

Initially, Wallace admits, "I was looking for a quick way to make some money by selling the land. But I went to a Longmont City Council hearing where they voted on whether it was feasible to include the property in the planning area. Two or three of the council members made comments that they didn't want to get some kind of exclusive enclave that did not mesh with Longmont itself. They also had concerns about the quality of growth.

"I grew up in South Texas, where I was always thinking about the growth there, and how ugly, out of control and mismanaged it was. The architecture didn't match the environment. I realized this was actually an opportunity to do something about what I'd always complained about. I felt that I needed to do something that I could live with, and be proud of."

A few days after the council meeting, Wallace read a Wall Street Journal articlle about the husband and wife team of Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, who operate a Miami-based firm called DPZ.

Both have become influential experts in creating neighborhoods within the context Wallace had envisioned, and he hired the team to lead a week-long charette - an architectural brainstorming and design workshop - last January. During those sessions, the proposed site plan for annexation evolved.

Duany and Plater-Zyberk brought their own team to interact with a number of local architects. The property, now referred to as Burlington Village, has a proposed site plan that is horseshoe shaped. It is oriented to take advantage of the views of Longs, St. Vrain, Mount. Audubon and South Arapahoe peaks.

Wallace originally grew up farming in McAllen, Texas, near Brownsville and the Mexican border. He has lived and farmed extensively around this country and the world.

Wallace's background provides him with an inherent appreciation of the land and a sustainable approach toward its use. "You preserve the quality of the life by preserving the qUality of the land. If You build with enough density, then you don't have to destroy the land. The main thing is you make sure growth happens from the inside Out, and it grows gradually Outside the town. If not, you have all this suburban-type development that sprawls out, eventually you run out of land. The cheaper use of the land is usually a cheaper type of housing."

Duany and Plater-Zyberk headquarter their architectural and town planning practice in Miami and have adjunct offices in Boston and near Washington, D.C. They have produced more than 30 new-town and urban-revitalization plans. Their practice also includes writing codes for the new towns and for existing municipalities.

Duany feels much of what gives growth a bad name is traffic. Many of our problems today, he feels, can be remedied by a pattern of growth that as a country, with an exception of the war years, we have exercised for 200 years.

Duany and Plater-Zyberk aren't really proposing anything new. In fact they're proposing something very old that worked - the traditional neighborhood.

Duany believes few traditional neighborhoods exist today. Some of their characteristics are limited size, being able to walk from the edge to center in less than five minutes and mixed use where people work, shop, live and gather all in the same area.

There is a mix of incomes. There are clearly defined and well-designed public spaces. The streets are narrow and create comfortable pedestrian thoroughfares. There are often alleyways, which accommodate utility lines and pipes and allow streets to be narrower.

"The plans of a traditional neighborhood have a network of streets, almost capillary, almost like the circulation system of the body," Duany says. "There are lots and lots of ways to get around, and its all connected."

Unfortunately, uncontrolled suburban growth has almost completely replaced the traditional neighborhood thanks to building codes throughout the country.

"Codes are like genetic material, they're the DNA of a city," Duany says. "What's set into code will happen."

As a result of suburban sprawl, the car has become, as Duany puts it, a "prosthetic device."

In Burlington Village, "it is our intention to design for Kiki and Longmont a neighborhood that is a model of how growth should and could be happening," Duany explains. But there is danger in this model, if people only follow some of the patterns. The system Duany and Plater-Zyberk propose, they say, is a complete "organic" system. If you leave something out, it won't work.

Wallace sees Boulder's Mapleton Hill neighborhood as a model for much of what he envisions for Burlington Village. He envisions "one-story houses with dormers, porches, alleys ... Burlington Village will have architectural codes that will govern the materials used, the pitches of the roofs, and the use of synthetic materials will be minimized."

"There will be a lot of latitude with what people can do, but there will be enough in there to govern the aesthetics. We are going to have solar code so everything will have to be built with a solar orientation. We want to try to get alternative-type housing out there, as long as they meet the codes for their exterior appearance.

"In the design, we're trying to capture the history of Longmont to make sure it is part of Longmont. In fact, the original colonists from Chicago who founded what is now known as Longmont called it Burlington Village. The original Burlington School is just down the road from the current Burlington Village. We are trying to make a distinct neighborhood.

"It will capture its own traffic through implementing in the design the use of industrial, office and retail space right there in the neighborhood. People will be encouraged to walk from their house to work and some shopping, which will stop a lot of this needless driving around."

Wallace has brought in Dale Bruns as a partner to help him achieve some of these goals. Bruns, a lifetime Longmont resident, was the developer for Rainbow Ridge, which is adjacent to Wallace's property.

"He has a success rate that a lot of developers don't," Wallace says. "Most developments don't quite make it to fruition or completion. His has, and that just speaks for itself. It helps me a lot as far as having credibility, having someone behind me who is very pragmatic and knows how to get things done. He's very supportive of this. He thinks that down the road people are going to have to offer more than people offer now to have an edge on the market."

Wallace feels the neo-traditional design has a lot of the fundamentals that are found in co-housing projects. He's begun talking with Boulder developer Jim Leach about developing a co-housing subcommunity within the development. This would include maybe 35 of the anticipated 350 houses.

Leach is the developer of Lafayette's Nyland co-housing community, as well as other co-housing communities in various stages around the region.

Wallace also has talked with Habitat for Humanity, the city of Longmont's social services and the Housing Authority of Longmont about including low-cost housing in Burlington Village.

He would like to have a diverse community, but the bottom line is he'd like to achieve this without any government assistance. "I don't like government subsidies, because they attach a lot of crazy things to them. It can destroy what you're trying to do. I just don't know how we're going to achieve getting the lower income people in there yet. You have to be careful when you say lower income, because lower income in Boulder County is con sidered a $40,000 a year salary. It's not lower income, it's just what they classify it as.

Currently Wallace and Dale Bruns are working on the project's financing. There are two other possibilities partners, one from Rhode Island and Duany, who may take a small percentage. "I'm trying to finance it from within and avoid having to go to outside sources," Wallace says. "The financing is for the infrastructure all the hard costs of the Sewage, water, sidewalks, gutters and all that. We'll probably need a million dollars."

The application for annexation was turned in at the end of May. The developers are hoping to have that whole process complete by the middle or end of October, when they want to put in the infrastructure and start building houses.

The lots will range from 500 to 2,400 square feet and should sell from $18,000 to $35,000 each. The dimensions are somewhat misleading, Wallace says, because of large setbacks and alleyways that are not included in the lot dimension. He plans to start taking reservations for lots sometime in August.

Wallace also plans to live in Burlington Village. He's planted something that takes longer to grow than the vegetable garden he's used to. "I'm going to try to settle down now. I have no choice because I've made a commitment. I can't leave. It looks like this crop won't start maturing for five or 10 years. There's a little longer term on this type of deal. But it's easier because you don't have to worry about the weather, and you don't have to worry about an act of God or anything like that. Things are a lot more consistent; the factors are a lot more uniform."