Consideration of a controversial development for the old Coggins farm property in Riceville, near Warren Wilson College, slid off the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners’ agenda.

In meetings leading to the postponed public hearing, neighbors had taken advantage of the public comment portion of the meeting to plead with the commissioners to reject plans for a 382-home development with additional commercial units.

 The 169-acre parcel was once a working farm — and that is something the county commissioners continually recommit to preserve. As planned, the community would have included 50,000 square feet of office and retail space, and possibly a school.

The farm concept would be preserved to supply a farm-to-table restaurant, which would also be on the property.

To build the developers’ dream, rendered as a quaint and flourishing village in architectural watercolors; though, the commissioners had to approve a zoning change.

The development would have been the first big construction project in the county since the onset of the Great Recession. And, as can be expected from huge land-use modifications, the NIMBY (Not in my backyard)cry went out.

The arguments against the project were typical of the outcry from other such area developments.

Neighbors were concerned about increased traffic and viewshed destruction. Some referred to the development as an affront to history, while others were concerned about wildlife habitat and river siltation. Worse, following the recession, they asked what would happen if the developer were to go bankrupt and leave a big, ugly patch of half-baked foundations behind.

 Developer David Case had plans to build a mini-town. He was involved with a project known as Civano in Tucson, Ariz., which received recognition from President Bill Clinton by way of the National Partnership for Advancing Technology in Housing.

The project was to be the antithesis to sprawl. From a design perspective it was state-of-the-art; but to date it hobbles behind schedule, hit like so much else in the building industry, by the Great Recession.

 As the Riceville project progressed, the developer reached out to the Riceville community for input with two charettes and other community meetings.

Case said he would be willing to reduce the number of housing units by one-third. Postponement of the public hearing is presumably to buy more time to work out a compromise with the neighbors.

What’s more, Case is on record as saying, “We are devoting our lives to this thing.”