A Canadian developer planning to build a warm-water attraction next to Arrowhead Golf Course in Douglas County has received a cold reception from neighbors, including the course operator.

“A commercial development in this neighborhood would be a colossal disaster. Not just for the wildlife, but for the people who live here,” said Bridget Epp, 64, who’s lived in the community for eight years.

Epp is a leader of the local “Save our Rox” group, which for the last three years has been pushing back against plans to develop a 35-acre site largely surrounded by the golf course. The land features towering, jagged red rock formations similar to those seen in nearby Roxborough State Park and Red Rocks in Morrison.

And earlier this month, Pomeroy Lodging, a firm based in Calgary, purchased the land for $3.5 million.

“The location speaks for itself … It’s a pretty spectacular piece of property,” said Ryan Laurie, Pomeroy’s director of asset management.

Pomeroy wants to erect what it calls a “Nordic spa” on the parcel. It likely will consist “of a collection of pools, saunas, steam rooms and indoor and outdoor relaxation spaces, also offering massage treatments and ancillary food & beverage and retail offerings,” according to documents the developer submitted to the county. Unlike hot springs, it would not use naturally heated water.

Pomeroy operates two other Nordic spas in Alaska and Alberta, along with a chain of hotels across Canada. This spa would be the company’s first development in the continental U.S.

The entire development likely won’t exceed 40,000 square feet and will operate from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily, according to the documents. It would bring hundreds more cars through the Roxborough Park community.

The setting is the primary source of contention between the developer and nearby homeowners, who see the land as the “heartbeat” of their 1,056-home community.

Roxborough’s unique geology is part of the “Ancestral Rockies,” red rock formations that predate the modern Rocky Mountains by hundreds of millions of years. Eventually, these rocky red spires served as the nucleus for a housing development and golf course founded in the 1970s.

Since the neighborhood’s inception, the land Pomeroy purchased, known as “The Homestead,” was planned for residential development, per a letter submitted to Douglas County by the neighborhood’s HOA president, Brian Lence.

The previous owners, Martha Luby Lahana and Frederick Henke, bought the land in 1998 for $575,000, records show. They had planned to construct just a single home on the site to preserve the landscape, according to a January 1998 neighborhood newsletter. That structure was never built, and in 2021, Pomeroy submitted a request to the county to rezone the land from residential to club/resort. The neighbors immediately began to mobilize.

“All of our opposition to the spa coming here and being placed in the middle of our residential community is based off of the seven approval criteria (needed to rezone the land). We believe strongly that Pomeroy fails six of the seven – so it isn’t even close,” Epp said.

She said the potential for overburdening Sundown Trail, the one-lane road leading to the golf course, “is a major issue.”

The golf course agrees with the homeowners.

Scott Siddons, general counsel for Arrowhead’s Dallas-based parent company Arcis Golf, wrote in a letter to the county planning commission that Pomeroy’s spa would have a “detrimental effect” on the course’s operations.

Pomeroy plans to construct the spa on the east side of the rocks, requiring the usage of a 35-year-old easement that splits several holes and would extend Sundown Trail to connect the development to the community. Siddons and Arcis argue that this easement exists only for residential developments and therefore would not apply to Pomeroy’s project.

“Given the topography and the significant amount of car and golf cart cross traffic, the likelihood of an accident is dramatically increased,” Siddons said in the letter.

And finally, there’s concerns about the tranquility on the course — which detractors of the plan say the spa will disrupt.

“The drilling, the grading that will have to take place, the trucks that will have to come up here, all the infrastructure will have to go in: sewers, electric, the whole internet piece of it will definitely degrade the red rocks. The wildlife will go away – they’re not going to put up with that noise,” Epp said.

Marcus Pachner, a land use consultant hired by Pomeroy, told BusinessDen the firm has a plan to assuage the concerns of the course and the neighbors, but it needs to first get the land rezoned.

“We think there’s tremendous opportunities in our site planning process — right in the construction phase — to work with the golf course and actually provide some benefit to them … They have a great challenge on wedding facilities. They set up a number of tents that are adjacent to our property,” Pachner said. “Is there a way to actually help them with some facilities that better serve their guests and their use as well?”

Pachner said that Pomeroy is “exploring all options” when it comes to how the company would connect the spa to Roxborough’s roads. It would like to use the easement from the golf course to the east, he said, but Pomeroy could potentially access the site from the west. However, Pachner said that option would be more “intrusive” and “obstructive” to the community as spa patrons would have to circle the entire development to enter.

Pomeroy’s challenges accessing the site to go beyond just the easement. The Roxborough Park Foundation, which functions as the community’s HOA, privately owns all the roads in Roxborough Park. Last week, Pomeroy sued the foundation — which the company said “has taken a position of extreme opposition to development” — in an effort to be allowed to use the neighborhood streets.

For those living nearby, Pachner said that Pomeroy’s plan for a spa doesn’t necessarily have to conflict with their desire for open space around the red rocks. The company plans to develop only eight to 10 acres of the total 35, he said.

“The one thing that we have heard from the community is they want to have assurance that this cannot turn into something else. So in our land-use application, we are specifically not allowing a future hotel to be developed. We’re not allowing other uses that are not consistent with a Nordic spa,” Pachner said.

Pomeroy does have supporters in Roxborough Park.

“To me, this is already commercial,” said 53-year-old Heather Hill, who has lived there for 17 years. “We’re already developed in here. I would rather augment this commercial area and salvage all of this natural beauty, literally, like all the way around. And also, then this becomes a human-built space that you can actually access and enjoy, and it really will be quite beautiful.”

David Jones, 51, said he believes development could improve lingering issues on Sundown Trail, which “is a mess right now during golf tournaments during the summer.”

“There’s an opportunity for the two entities to work together for a joint parking strategy that works and improves all that vehicular circulation, parking, the whole experience,” said Jones, who used to work as a commercial architect in Denver.

Now, all eyes are on the Douglas County Planning Commission. In 2023, Pomeroy postponed hearings with the commission twice, citing a need for more time to solidify its plans and engage further with the community.

“I think a lot of those questions that have been asked are simply, ‘We don’t want anything to happen,’ Pachner said. “We don’t think that’s a realistic conversation. And that’s frankly one of the reasons we decided to move forward and own the site.”

But opponents of Pomeroy’s plans say they’re committed to continuing to fight.

“(Pomeroy) could have moved to a lot of other places in Colorado. They came to this specific place because of those red rocks – because of the formation – and that is under threat. Not only for us as people who live here but for the wildlife as well,” Epp said.

This story was reported by our partner BusinessDen.