Much of the development in Pittsboro getting buzz is in the Chatham Park area east of downtown – especially as the major project recently announced a partnership with Disney to develop on hundreds of acres of land.
But a project on the other side of Pittsboro, around one mile west, recently received town approval and is set to similarly bring an array of new housing options within the next decade.
Edward Holmes Jr. grew up in Pittsboro, and he says he remembers when his parents were renting a property on the expansive Reeves Farm in the 1960s. A businessman who ran the Holmes Oil Company for many years before its sale in 2021, he says he has fond memories of running around the farm animals and believes the land provides a beautiful scene as people drive toward the historical downtown on U.S. Hwy. 64 Business.
Holmes was approached by the remaining family and landowners of the farm in 2021, when they told him they planned to sell it. He shared some advice with the family about retaining real estate attorneys and seeking national bidders.
But, as Holmes told the Pittsboro Planning Board last July, he kept thinking about Reeves Farm and his own idea of how the land could be used.
“And I decided I want to come and make an offer to buy the property,” Holmes said, “and I want to create a development that would be something I would be proud to be part of Pittsboro. I also want to integrate it into the character of Pittsboro and not have it as a separate, free-standing community – but have it as part of the fabric, just an extension of Pittsboro going west.”
The Reeves family eventually accepted the offer in December, approving nearly 500 acres of land for a $19.6 million sale to Holmes and the father-son pair of Buddy Keller III and Carter Keller. Now, that project’s concept is taking shape: hundreds of housing units, of varying types, across 360 acres of the property.
The Pittsboro Board of Commissioners approved a conditional zoning request for the Reeves Farm project in mid-November, allowing for neighborhood-style construction and mixed-use development to be built over the next 10 to 12 years. According to concepts presented to the commissioners, the developers plan to build at several levels of density, ranging from single-family homes to duplexes to multi-family buildings.
Among the conditions negotiated between the town and developers, 7.5 percent of those residential units – which do not have a confirmed amount as of November – will be priced as affordable housing, while most of the neighborhoods will be priced for residents of varying income levels.
A conceptual master plan presented by Reeves Farm Pittsboro developers to the town board. The legend shows the type of density character that fits both the land’s topography and connectivity efforts, with the darker colors representing higher density areas and black dotted lines representing future roads. (Photo via Reeves Farm Pittsboro LLC.)
Land planner Jody Leidolf, who is working with Holmes and the Kellers, told the Pittsboro commissioners that his group “exhausted all the documents on town shelves” about growth frameworks to inform the early concepts for Reeves Farm. During that stretch, he discovered comments made by the land’s prior owner, Thomas Reeves, made during the 1970 Land Development Potential Study – where he predicted the availability of jobs would ultimately impact how livable Chatham County could be.
“Chatham County’s economic development program over the last year,” Leidolf said, “is really pushing job growth and there is a need and response for housing. So, in our minds, that stewardship of transitioning from a dairy farm to actually a neighborhood for Pittsboro is utterly important – and we took Tom Reeves’ lead on that.”
To help achieve the sense that Reeves Farm will extend the existing character of Pittsboro, one of the conditions for the new zoning is maintaining a viewshed corridor along U.S. Highway 64, with Reeves Farm committing more than 22 acres to be open space and available for greenway or bike path connections. Both Holmes and Leidolf stressed their desire for not just their future neighborhoods to be walkable, but for the development to easily connect to the rest of Pittsboro’s nearby amenities – like the town’s Agricultural and Conference Center, Pittsboro Elementary School, Central Carolina Community College, the county library, and downtown Pittsboro.
Based on such collaboration with town staff and previously taking board feedback into consideration, Reeves Farm received little feedback with the commissioners’ unanimous vote of approval on November 13. But Commissioner John Bonitz voiced his support for the housing philosophies described by the developers, calling it a commendable approach.
“I really do love the density,” he said, “and I would say make it denser. Let’s get the lower density transitions and go more toward that missing middle [style]: duplexes, triplexes, quadplexes, or condominiums. Adding more units on fewer acres is a good thing because then we’re conserving the landscape and appreciating that for what it is.”
While the project will continue its design phase, much of its construction will be beholden to Pittsboro’s planned sewer expansion after it merged its utilities with the City of Sanford in 2023. Kyle Shipp, who was mayor-elect at the time, spoke with 97.9 The Hill after the vote and made note of that detail. He said with that in mind, it will be just one element of several changes expected just west of downtown.
“This is one of the first projects we’ve seen come through after the merger and now that we have a pathway to sewer, which has been a critical bottleneck for a long time,” said Shipp. “The Ag Center had a lot of plans to expand as well and add some exhibition areas. The hope is that this [Reeves Farm] project will have a hotel, largely for the Ag Center. So, that area of town is going to look very different in ten years.”
Photo via Reeves Farm Pittsboro LLC.
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