A new glamping development featuring Airstream trailers broke ground up the road from Joshua Tree National Park’s main entrance in late January. Renderings from the company behind the project, AutoCamp, show a beautiful scene where cactuses and other plants surround a hip-looking campus.
“Relax in the mid-century modern Quonset Hut Clubhouse before grabbing a cocktail at the outdoor bar and exploring the local artist installations around the property,” AutoCamp’s website says of its upcoming high desert attraction. “In the warmer months, dive right in with a refreshing dip in our large plunge pool (turned hot tub in the winter months).”
Local environmentalists have expressed optimism that the 55-unit development on 26.15 acres near the corner of Highway 62 and Sunburst Street in Joshua Tree might provide a model for coexisting with the environment and keeping out larger hotel chains. With the nearby park’s visitation growing and the pandemic allowing white-collar workers to log on from anywhere with internet, more development is likely on the horizon.
But the area’s popularity comes with a price, as communities including Joshua Tree and Yucca Valley are contending with builders stripping land and housing costs spiraling.
“We have to get real about the fact that visitation will continue to increase, and nothing can be done about that,” said Miriam Seger, a high desert environmental advocate and real estate investor. “AutoCamp is about the most interesting lodging model we could hope for.”
Yet, when she accompanied The Desert Sun and members of local environmental nonprofit Morongo Basin Conservation Association on a March site visit of AutoCamp’s property, Seger said she felt “a bit shocked to see how complete the disturbance is after being prepared to defend the project.” Amid the construction, for example, she saw a pile of dead creosote bushes that had been cleared by workers.
Steve Bardwell, president of the Morongo Basin Conservation Association, was also taken aback. “Boy, they sure cleared a good-sized area,” he remarked as he looped around the construction site, peering through a chain-link fence. Construction stripped vegetation and the top layer of dirt from a portion of the property where a parking lot will go, and grit billowed in the wind.
“When you scrape the desert, dust follows,” Bardwell said, adding that he was concerned about the water that would be needed to revegetate the property once construction is complete.
Still, he was pleased to see approximately 10 western Joshua trees sprouting from AutoCamp’s property, where orange plastic construction fencing was strung in neat circles around them to warn off workers and their heavy equipment.
“It’s nice to see they left some of this,” Bardwell said approvingly from beyond the fence, pointing out the Joshua trees and other untouched desert shrubs.
At a time when other construction has been linked to rumors of environmental woes such as Joshua tree poaching, Seger and her high desert compatriots say AutoCamp’s project is better than many alternatives. Still, conservationists are posing the question: Can more be done to protect the desert’s natural resources?
‘All about connecting people with nature’
AutoCamp’s desert location is expected to open this fall and will be the company’s fourth site, after developments near Yosemite National Park, Cape Cod and the Russian River in Sonoma County. A fifth and sixth are planned near Zion National Park and the Catskills in 2022.
According to the company, it raised $115 million in 2019 to fund its expansion. Most nights at its properties start around $200 or $300, with prices rising to roughly $600 per night for stays on certain weekends.
Ryan Miller, the company’s co-founder and chief brand officer, responded to questions via email, laying out steps the business took to cut down on energy consumption, treat wastewater and preserve local vegetation in Joshua Tree.
At its core, AutoCamp is “all about connecting people with nature and each other, honoring the tradition of ‘hitting the road’ while encouraging the exploration of the great outdoors,” he said.
Miller said construction crews occasionally spray water to tamp down the dust, and there’s a phone number listed on the site that neighbors can call if the work kicks up too much of it.
When planning the development, he said, AutoCamp “met with local business owners, artists/art organizers, and an environmental group for recommendations and comments,” which were worked into the design, although he didn’t say which group.“Our project has a variety of water- and energy-saving measures that go above and beyond the building code,” he said.
These include efficient fixtures, waterless urinals and a 23-kilowatt solar system that doubles as a shade structure. The company also designed the buildings to limit the volume of indoor space that needs air conditioning and will treat its wastewater to put it back into the ground. Seger said the company’s method of dealing with wastewater is novel for the area, and she hopes similar treatment systems will become more economical as additional local businesses consider and ultimately adopt them.
“We’ve proactively worked to ensure that construction has very little impact on the environment,” Miller wrote. “We’re preserving all the existing Joshua trees on the property, using low-water xeriscaping for landscaping, and low lighting to adhere to the local Dark Sky ordinance.”
Tourism helps drive a housing crunch
Environmental concerns are only half the story when it comes to development in the high desert. Data show that as interest in the area continues to skyrocket so too have real estate prices.
The “typical” home value in Joshua Tree is currently $287,716, according to data that online real estate company Zillow shared with The Desert Sun. That price differs slightly from the median value of homes in the area, but it’s the company’s attempt to smooth out seasonal fluctuations and other quirks of the market.
Zillow’s historical data highlight the recent surge in costs: The present value of a typical home in Joshua Tree is up about 21% from last year and up about 117% from five years ago when it was $132,693.
Although it’s not a problem for AutoCamp alone to address, Bardwell questioned where service workers including those at the new development could afford to live. While rising prices are great for those who own their homes, about 26% of Joshua Tree residents live in poverty, and about 48% do not live in housing that they own, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Nearby, about 66% of Yucca Valley residents live in homes they own, a number that plummets to 32% in Twentynine Palms.
According to data shared with The Desert Sun by website Apartment List, median rent prices in March in San Bernardino County were $1,673, about 27% higher than at the same time in 2017, which is as far back as their statistics go. In the same timeframe, Riverside County saw its median monthly rent prices rise about 25%, depicting how the housing crunch extends across the Inland Empire.
This growth also corresponds with the surging popularity of Joshua Tree National Park. Although it was only designated in 1994, the park has quickly become a destination for everything from weddings to Instagram photoshoots for visitors from Southern California and beyond.
Last year was the first time in seven years the park didn’t set annual visitation records, and it likely would have broken records if not for temporary shutdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Balancing conservation, development
Preserving native plants makes sense for a glamping site looking to meld luxury with nature, but such steps might become the norm in the high desert — potentially forcing developers to plan around the plant in the future — as a closely watched fight is underway to protect the western Joshua tree.
The species is currently protected as a candidate for listing under the California Endangered Species Act, meaning it has legal protections for a year while the state conducts further studies. The California Fish and Game Commission is expected to decide on its future in December. If it’s upvoted, the species would become the first protected under the state law with climate change listed as its main threat.
As money continues flowing into the high desert, the listing process faces resistance. The construction, renewables and real estate industries fear that taking the next step would stymie development, and the California Construction and Industrial Materials Association has been trying — so far unsuccessfully — to block it in court.
Joshua Tree resident Brendan Cummings is the conservation director for the Center for Biological Diversity and authored the petition seeking to list the plant as threatened. He believes conservation and economic activity can coexist.
He pointed to several exemptions negotiated by the various stakeholders that many viewed as a win-win. One would give authority back to three local jurisdictions — San Bernardino County, Yucca Valley and the city of Palmdale — to handle permitting for the removal of Joshua trees at single-family homes and public works projects.
The county, however, is refusing to accept the exemption, and its deference to the state could make it more difficult to earn a permit.
In an email, San Bernardino County spokesperson David Wert said that the county code already protects Joshua trees. “Rather than invest scarce county resources in creating and maintaining a short-lived bureaucracy, the county will continue to focus on developing a regional, science-based conservation strategy that would provide long-term protection for Joshua trees,” he said.
Meanwhile, Yucca Valley went ahead with the compromise in January and has approved seven take permits since then. According to Curtis Yakimow, Yucca Valley’s town manager, it made sense to accept as much local control as possible because the plants are on almost every parcel in town. About 30% of residents are in the process of connecting to a new, centralized wastewater system, he said.
He said via email that, if the city didn’t have authority to approve take permits, most “residential building permits would have required the project applicant to request and engage the State Department of Fish and Wildlife for an individual take permit, and significantly complicate and delay simple private property improvements.”
Research suggests that western Joshua trees’ generation time — how long it takes for a new generation of plants to produce offspring — is at least several decades, meaning conservation must focus on existing plants. “The idea is you want to encourage relocation instead of killing it,” Cummings said.
As the political drama plays out in Sacramento, local activists are keeping a watchful eye over the nature that comprises their backyard.
High desert residents alleged that unnamed developers or homeowners have illegally poached the plants without securing the necessary permits. Jordan Traverso, spokesperson for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, confirmed that “this matter is under investigation” but declined to comment further.
During the recent visit to AutoCamp’s site, machinery clanked as workers dug trenches to install plumbing at the individual units, all the while leaving the fenced-off Joshua trees untouched.
But many long-term high desert residents won’t be satisfied until the same ecotourism that draws people to the national park permeates every aspect of new construction. Green resorts are big business elsewhere in the world, so why not here, they ask.
“I’m still waiting for that special development that checks off all the boxes,” Seger said.
Mark Olalde covers the environment for The Desert Sun. Get in touch at molalde@gannett.com, and follow him on Twitter at @MarkOlalde.