More than 50 residents arrived at the Kingswood development open house ready to reiterate their feelings from three years ago, which was, "it's not going to happen."
The biggest issue was the proposed traffic increase on Scott Crescent.
"I'm disappointed that you haven't found another traffic solution," resident Jim Sandford, who openly opposed a similar Kingswood development proposal in 2008, said during the meeting on Thursday (March 31) at the Adventure Centre.
"I'm seeing identical to what I saw five years ago and I'm actually flabbergasted. It's hard for me to say this because I know you've put a lot of time and effort into this, but going up Scott Crescent is not going to happen.
"Make no mistake: It's not going to happen."
Those in attendance burst into applause.
Concerned residents voiced their issues with access, traffic, location, density and environmental complications. Most who turned up had already been to a Kingswood meeting in 2008, when an application to rezone the 8.3-acre site for the controversial Red Point development failed to get third reading.
In April 2010, Kingswood's application to build an RV park on the same site was shelved when council established a maximum 30-day consecutive stay in any six-month period for all tourist-oriented recreational vehicles.
The meeting was not a public hearing but was required by the district as part of the rezoning application process.
"A lot of you remember that we were here a few years ago with what we called Red Point and we're back," said Cornerstone architect Scott Kennedy, "with some other ideas."
Kingswood's proposed mixed-use development for the 8.3-acre site includes three components - a retail section, an institutional section (for the climbing centre) and a residential section that would include 388 townhome units.
According to Kingswood representatives, the retail component would be focused on climbing and outdoor recreation, and the housing would be designed to be compatible with Squamish's Official Community Plan.
That's contingent on being granted rezoning by District of Squamish council, which hasn't seen the plan yet. Coun. Doug Race was the only council member to attend the meeting.
Kennedy focused on the changes made in support of Squamish's outdoor recreation opportunities.
"These will contribute significantly to the district's long-term goal of providing public access to the Upper Mamquam Blind Channel and improving public access to Smoke Bluffs Park," he said.
That includes building a waterfront trail along the development, building a connection trail to downtown and improving the Hunter Trail.
However, several attendees said they feel vehicle access is the core issue not being addressed.
Access is a big issue because the highway median makes Scott Crescent a right in, right out road. That means the most direct route for anyone leaving the proposed development and heading south would be along the upper part of Scott Crescent.
Hospital Hill residents are concerned that traffic will increase significantly on the upper portion of Scott Crescent, which is currently a sparsely populated, narrow gravel road connecting to Clark Drive. Kingswood plans to turn the gravel road into a two-lane paved road.
Mark Willmot, who lives on the gravel road, said he does not support a significant increase in traffic there.
"The access street, which now has four or five houses on it, is going to have the traffic of 400 houses on it," he said.
"It doesn't make sense - it sits right on the highway, so why are we using a back-ass way to get in there?"
Willmot was also concerned about decreasing the value of his property for the sake of a development.
"This land originally sold very cheap because it had bad access - so why now do we take that land, make it more valuable by giving it more access, thereby decreasing the value of our houses? How is that fair?" he said.
"The value of our house will decrease drastically. Price is dramatically different if you don't live on a main route."
According to Kingswood officials, the amount of anticipated traffic during morning rush hour would be about 155 vehicle trips (inbound and outbound) going all directions, or just over two vehicles per minute. In the morning, much of the traffic is directed to and from the north, and roughly two-thirds of that would be using the right turn onto the highway.
In the afternoon, with additional trips, anticipated volume would be 240 vehicle trips, or just under four vehicles per minute on average.
Amanda Neumann, who also lives on the upper portion of Scott Crescent, said there was no need for such a project.
"There's only 100 houses in all of Hospital Hill and they want to put 400 in a small, condensed property," she said.
"Squamish has enough condensed-living places with over 600 units for sale right now and many developments sitting unfinished. This is the wrong project for this neighbourhood."
The promise of a National Climbing Centre did little to dispel concerns about the development that goes along with it. In fact, it appeared to make people even more upset.
"I am a climber and I'm adamantly opposed to everything including the National Climbing Centre," said resident Brian Vincent, who lives in Hospital Hill.
"The climbing centre is just a sweetener that you've added to a very bitter-tasting pie that you're trying to force down this community's throat. This whole development is nightmarish."
Willmot, who is also a climber, also accused the developer of using the proposed climbing centre as an inducement.
"The climbing wall is a bribe - we'll give you this as long as we get what we want," he said. "I like to climb but I'm not going to go and give up what I believe in just because I want a climbing wall."
Kennedy, who designed the centre, said the plan was to incorporate the centre in the first phase of building, and Kingswood would cover the cost of construction. The building would be 5,000 square feet, with 3,800 square feet of that devoted to the climbing gym.
He explained that the climbing wall would be a commercial operation and ideally the National Climbing Centre Society (who would operate the rest of the building) would eventually be able to sustain itself.
One climber in the crowd asked why the Squamish facility be would called the National Climbing Centre when only an hour away, in Coquitlam, there is a 15,000-square-foot centre.
"The operational cost of this facility has to be commercially viable and you don't want to saddle a community with too big a climbing gym that there aren't enough climbers to support," Kennedy said.
"So there's a balance in creating this climbing facility to make it economically viable - we don't want to build a white elephant."
"Fair enough, but maybe it should be called the local climbing centre then," retorted the climber.
"We struggled with that question ourselves," Kennedy said.
"The National Climbing Centre is more of a non-profit society to promote climbing in the region and that's why it becomes 'national,' because it's going to be promoting that."
Despite the detailed slides and answers to most questions, the attitude in the room towards the project did not change.
"I feel like the climbing centre is a distraction to what's really happening, which is this high density," said Marion VonDehn. "You just had a proposal with Red Point that was decimated and it was less density than this."
"Having high density when we already have a dying downtown and developments galore is ridiculous and I think we should be putting our energies into filling up the dead space in the downtown instead of decimating a beautiful park area."
Sandford finished with a bit of an ultimatum.
"Five years ago when Red Point 1.0 started, we were very against putting traffic there and we made that very clear," he said.
"Hospital Hill and Valleycliffe came together because it affects surrounding neighbourhoods and that's a lot of votes. And there's an election in November. This proposal, gentleman, is an election issue in 2011 in Squamish. Make no mistake."
