Southern gateway may rival Maryland Farms

By Jim East
– Brentwood (TN) Jounal –

"We’re in the process of trying to understand what the availability of utilities is going to be," said Phil Fawcett, executive manager of Boyle’s Brentwood office.

But he compared the Berry project to Boyle’s 460-acre Schilling Farms development in Collierville.

That project will have more than 900 homes within walking distance of a middle school, 80 acres of luxury office buildings, 70 acres of distribution space, parks, shops, apartments, a YMCA, a church and a day-care center.

"Once we kind of begin our planning process, we’ll develop a time line and then we’ll know more about it," Fawcett said Tuesday. Swain said she felt “a great sense of responsibility as a steward of the property on behalf of the generations that loved this land, and Boyle has an interest in preserving the heritage of the land that is unlike any other."

After Swain’s father died in 1996, she said she and other family members realized they would be beset with numerous offers for the valuable land and would have to decide on what to do with one of the last gateways to Franklin.

"The land had been in our family over many generation, but times were changing and I knew a decision would need to be made. The movement of the town was down I-65 South and our interchange was next in line. "It was very important to keep the land as a unit and not piecemeal it. To have a high-end development, that would be a legacy for the county, the town and for our family. This would only be accomplished by having a developer with the same values as we did ­ the values of history, tradition and the desire to make a statement for the present and the future.

"We had many offers, but found in Boyle the same goals and value system that is in our family."

Swain said she wants the project to recapture some of her most positive experiences as a child growing up on Third Avenue in Franklin.

"We want it to be a great place to live, work, shop or just enjoy the beauty and heritage of the land for generations to come.”"