In rainier days, Lewis McNeel would drop all the pieces to drive out of city and leap into the cool, clear and spring-fed waters of a seasonal creek flowing freely alongside the limestone cliffs on his household’s land.
It’s an expertise he stated “that may’t be beat,” and one the San Antonio resident hopes everybody can have the chance to understand sometime.
In February, McNeel bought the land, owned by his household for generations, to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Division (TPWD) for that very cause.
Conserving land conserves water
The land in far west Bexar County and Medina County expands the 12,000-acre Authorities Canyon State Pure Space by 823 acres and contributes to vital water useful resource conservation and groundwater recharge.
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Fee directed division employees to maneuver ahead with buying the land in November, the identical time commissioners authorised one other land buy adjoining to the Enchanted Rock State Pure Space.
The company paid $43 million for 3,073 acres — or about $14,000 an acre — to broaden the favored park in Llano County, close to Fredericksburg.
The Authorities Canyon deal closed in February, with the company paying $8 million, or over $9,000 an acre, from the state’s Sporting Items Gross sales Tax and the Land and Water Conservation Fund, in response to a TPWD spokesman.
The going fee for undeveloped land within the Texas Hill Nation varies in response to the scale of the property, its location and developability, stated Andrea McGilvray, actual property dealer for Cowboy Capital Realty in Bandera. She lately bought a 120-acre property with stage land for about $8,000 an acre.
However conserving land is a technique the state can put together for future development. “We’re nonetheless rising by leaps and bounds, and the one method we are able to really preserve water is by having the water runoff going to the aquifer,” she stated.
‘Honest and equitable entry to nature’
The acquisition of McNeel’s property comes 20 years to the day that property often known as Canyon Ranch was purchased by TPWD to finish the long-running Authorities Canyon park mission and to guard 9 federally-listed endangered invertebrate species within the area.
For McNeel, the timing was proper, after inheriting a half-interest within the land in 2019.
“We obtained fairly inquisitive about the concept we may discover a method to assist the issue within the state of Texas of getting very, very, little or no publicly accessible or public land,” he stated. “So when the time got here to start out fascinated about what to do with this property … an thrilling alternative simply got here up.”
The proximity of Authorities Canyon made the land enticing to TPWD, which, in response to the fee’s assembly agenda, prioritizes buying adjoining properties from keen sellers to reduce operational and administration conflicts and guarantee conservation of the company’s public lands.
McNeel stated he has had many different gives to purchase the land. “If you personal land like this, you get texts each day or weekly from random, nameless individuals asking to carve up the land and promote it,” he stated.
However, as an architect and personal landowner, McNeel wished extra for the wilderness the place he grew up, tenting and path working — and for the creek beds, cliffs, hilltops, farmland and forests he knew so properly.
“My values and beliefs in regards to the constructed setting and what makes human life really price dwelling and helps individuals to really flourish is deeply aligned with this perspective of creating positive there’s truthful and equitable entry to nature,” he stated.
“What I work on, day in and time out is all types of initiatives involving methods to work together with the land round us, and methods to worth the pure assets and the setting round us,” he added.
There’s a conservation easement on the land, he stated, that serves to guard the Edwards Aquifer recharge zone however can even restrict subdivision of the land. The property sits simply north and west of the booming Alamo Ranch space.
Authorities Canyon boasts greater than 40 miles of trails, campsites and dinosaur tracks, and sits within the recharge zone. Whereas plans for the newly acquired property that sits west of the park haven’t been introduced, McNeel is gratified realizing the land, its assets and its future are protected.
“I believe everybody can agree and see that life is healthier when extra individuals have entry to extra facilities, or extra individuals have entry to wild locations and nature, and even simply have preserved swaths of land which you could drive previous and know that that land is preserved,” he stated.
