Ammon working to keep up with growth

What used to be fields and rural areas are now developments for thousands of new homes in Bonneville County. Rockwell Homes says it has introduced four new developments this year and have plans for four more next year. And that’s just one building company. It is seeing new developments all over Bonneville County.

“If you look at it by school district, you have all this growth that’s happening in (Idaho Falls) District 91 and you have all this growth that’s happening in (Bonneville County) District 93,” said Greg Hansen, vice president of Rockwell Homes. “And it literally is thousands of homes in both of those districts that are planned for or that are actually on the books or in development right now.”

One of those cities seeing growth is Ammon. It is the fourth largest city in Eastern Idaho with more than 15,000 people and more and more moving in.

“There’s still a lot of available land in Ammon,” said Ammon Mayor Sean Coletti. “Ammon has a very low tax base and it’s developing out its fiber optics. So it’s a little bit removed from downtown or the bigger part of the city so there’s some attraction to those things.”

Ammon has several projects in the works to keep up with the numbers. It is in the process of going to water meter rates so home and business owners pay for their water usage. It is also going to put in a stop light at the intersection of Sunnyside and Ammon Road, put in a hawk signal for pedestrians in front of Hillcrest High School on Sunnyside Road so students can cross safer and begin an urban renewal project on 1st St. between Hitt Road and Ammon Road. Even with the growth, the city still plans on maintaining its identity.

“Ammon is, I think, still going to maintain its small town residential feel,” Coletti said. “The residents really like it to feel like a bedroom community and the way we plan to design it for the future is to maintain that bedroom feel.”

Ammon has also recently completed park improvement projects.