River Run, a $200 million rural village proposed for Plymouth, includes 90,000 square feet of commercial and retail space, 1,100 homes and apartments, open space and walking trails.

A.D. Makepeace Co., the region’s largest cranberry grower, wants to build a mixed-use village in Plymouth.

The Wareham-based company will file an application for a special permit next month for River Run, a $200 million neighborhood with 90,000 square feet of commercial and retail space including a YMCA and an assisted-living facility. In addition, the development in the town’s South Plymouth neighborhood would include 1,100 homes and apartments, which would be connected to acres of open space and miles of walking trails.

“We could have built 650 McMansions, each a four-bedroom home with a three-car garage and a long driveway as of right,” said Michael Hogan, Makepeace’s president. “But we didn’t want to do that kind of development because of our commitment to land stewardship. The town of Plymouth and the conservation community didn’t want it either because they see a tremendous opportunity to conserve large amounts of the open space.”

Under the proposal slated for Wareham Road along the Agawam River and near Myles Standish State Forest, 1,600 acres would be protected from development. The 400-acre project also would include construction of an on-site wastewater treatment facility, a public water supply well and 12 miles of new roads, including a connector to Bourne Road. The dwellings will include small apartments to single-family homes. One-third of the units will be affordable or entry-level housing. Plymouth requires 10 percent of projects to be deed-restricted for income-eligible families.

Makepeace also has proposed to upgrade Wareham Road, and design and build a “modern roundabout” or provide signals for the intersections of Long Pond and Clark roads, Halfway Pond and Bourne roads, and Long Pond and Halfway Pond roads.

Robb Johnson, program director for southeastern Massachusetts at The Nature Conservancy, said while the details have to be worked out, the international nonprofit organization favors the project. “We are supportive because it would preserve hundreds of acres, and a high degree of rare and endangered species such as moths, butterflies, beetles and turtles,” he said. “We think the company’s willingness to use creative and cutting-edge zoning techniques is good for Plymouth.”

Under an agreement with the town of Plymouth, Makepeace traded its right to build single-family homes in favor of a denser development while preserving large tracts of green space. In addition, Town Meeting approved a zoning change that would create a traditional rural village development that allows commercial use.

But the proposal is expected to face opposition from residents who say the development will cripple traffic in the area. While Hogan gets high praise from community activists for working with residents, congestion remains the biggest obstacle to neighborhood support, according to Edward Russell, a member of the Six Ponds Association, an organization of residents who live near Clark Road off Route 3.

“Mike is a professional and Makepeace has reached out to the neighborhoods and that’s been a welcome change from the previous leadership,” said Russell. “But all the goodwill has not solved the traffic problem.”

The Makepeace parcel is located on dirt roads in a remote location, 10 miles from Exit 3 off Route 3. While a traffic study said the project is expected to generate 7,000 car trips daily, Russell indicated the impact could be much greater. “It’s a bottleneck and you can’t get there from here,” he said.

Still, Russell said he is not sure how the traffic problem could be mitigated.

“We have sat down and tried to find solutions, but it’s difficult,” he noted. “One obvious answer is to downsize the development. Some have said that the 650 single-family house lots would have a lesser impact on traffic.”

‘Weighing Alternatives’

Makepeace’s proposal is not the only project under consideration for the Plymouth area, according to residents. Good News Holdings, a California-based film company, is hoping to build a full-scale movie studio with soundstages and back lots on town-owned land not far from the Makepeace location.

Senate President Therese Murray, a Plymouth Democrat, has signaled support for the studio proposed for her hometown that proponents say would boost the region’s economy and generate as many as 2,000 jobs. The project could be ready for Town Meeting approval as early as next spring.

But the parcel, known to residents as “Thousand Acres” because of its size, has some neighbors worried about more traffic for the year-round facility.

Makepeace, a family business that was founded in 1870, has grown cranberries for five generations. The company calls itself the largest private landowner with 12,000 acres in southeastern Massachusetts. It also bills itself as the largest cranberry grower in the world, farming 1,920 acres. None of the acres under consideration for River Run are used to grow cranberries.

This is not the first time Makepeace has tried to develop its land. In 1999, the firm tried to convert 10,000 acres around its cranberry bogs into house lots in Carver, Plymouth, Middleborough and Wareham. But in 2001, following protests from a coalition of conservation groups and activists, the company withdrew the proposal.

Lee Hartmann, Plymouth’s director of planning and development, praised Makepeace for working with town officials, the neighborhoods and environmentalists to reach consensus on a plan for the site with which everyone can live.

“We are happy with where we are with River Run, but there are impacts,” he said. “Ideally this is not the place for development because it’s far from the highway, but it’s not a question of doing this or doing nothing. It’s weighing alternatives. I think we have put together a fairly decent package and it must go through the public process and permitting process to see if Makepeace can meet some of the access and infrastructure challenges.”

Hartmann stressed that the plan is for private roads, private water and wastewater, and low-density housing at one house per 3 acres. The agreement with Makepeace allows the developer to build one-, two-and three bedroom units that will have less impact on schools instead of a conventional subdivision, he added.

“I’m going to guess that at the end of the process, the developer will not be 100 percent happy and the neighborhood will not have the mitigation they had hoped for,” Hartmann said. “The community will have to decide. There are no other alternatives on the table. But Makepeace could do a conventional subdivision that does not require a special permit or open space, and there’s always [the state’s so-called anti-snob zoning law, Chapter] 40B.”