"There has been an effort to incorporate a lot of smart-growth principles into Highlands Ranch," said Pam Kiely, a land-use expert with Environment Colorado, a nonprofit advocacy group.
Would she live there herself? "Personally, no," Kiely said, the distaste evident in her voice. But professionally, she's much more worried about the environmental effect of the resort homes springing up on 35-acre plots of remote Colorado farmland than she is about Highlands Ranch.
Indeed, for all the carping, Highlands Ranch may turn out to be a model for master-planned developments, said Robert Fishman, a professor of urban planning at the University of Michigan.
The community started out as your typical cul-de-sac heaven, but its new, mixed-use neighborhoods lend it more variety and texture, said Fishman, who envisions a similar evolution in Southern California suburbs such as Irvine.
The ultra-chic Denver magazine 5280 even ran a recent essay on "finding happiness in the Front Range's least-hip 'hood" -- a full page devoted to the joys of Highlands Ranch, with a bare minimum of snarky asides.
With a population close to 90,000, Highlands Ranch is one of the bigger metro areas in Colorado, though it remains unincorporated. Residents are overwhelmingly white (91%, according to the 2000 census), affluent (the median household income tops $86,000) and well-educated (60% of adults have a college degree).
It is also heavily tilted toward families with young children. Eleven percent of the population was younger than 5 during the last census -- and just 3% was older than 65.
It was that demographic that drew Megan Chard to the Ranch, despite herself.
Chard, 35, grew up in the suburb of Littleton, Colo., and fled for downtown Denver as soon as she could. In love with the sometimes rowdy, sometimes gritty atmosphere of urban life, she vowed she would never move to a soccer-mom suburb, and especially not to Highlands Ranch -- "never in a million years."
Then she and her husband had their first child. Suddenly "transients in the alley, hypodermic needles on the sidewalk didn't look so good," Chard said.
With an average home price of $385,000 -- but many available in the $250,000 range -- the Ranch was more affordable than many suburbs closer to Denver. And it was full of kids: running from one backyard to the next, biking to the local park, splashing in the pools at the four recreational centers.
