CONSTRUCTION of a new 111-home housing tract in Huntington Beach may soon commence.

A housing project more than 20 years in the making could finally be happening. According to the City of Huntington Beach’s Community Development Department, construction plans for a tract of 111 single-family homes, along 23 acres of open space, have been submitted and are being reviewed for the issuing of permits.

Originally put forward to Shea Homes in 1996, the project for a 50-acre site west of Graham Street along the East Garden Grove-Wintersburg Flood Control Channel had to go through the lengthy process of approval by the California Coastal Commission.

Finally, in 2012, the commission approved the project, but attached several conditions. The completed plans and drawings reflecting those conditions have recently been submitted to the city’s building division for permits. If all permits are issued, construction of the project is expected to take about 30 months.

In addition to the single-family homes, the development will include:

• 23 acres of preserved, restored and “enhanced” open space;
• public trails, a “vista overlook” and a 1.6-acre neighborhood park;
• a water quality treatment system for the Slater Avenue watershed that now flows untreated to the Bolsa Chica wetlands and the ocean;
• upgrades to the city’s Slater pump station to improve handing of stormwater flows;
• improvements to the flood protection system which would remove thousands of properties from the flood plain zone.