Jan. 7, 2026 – Florida-based Lennar Corp. quietly has advanced plans to develop a gas station, two fast-food restaurants, a retail center and a two-story storage facility on the northeast corner of Scenic Loop and Babcock roads to support its proposed controversial Guajolote Ranch development nearby.
The plans were disclosed in a memo from Lennar’s engineering firm for Guajolote Ranch, Pape-Dawson Engineers Inc., to Bexar County on Oct. 3 – coming to light only recently – as an update to a Traffic Impact Analysis (TIA) for the area first approved in 2022. It raises new questions about public impact of the overall proposed Lennar development, with implications for traffic, safety and the environment.
A site plan map with the memo indicates a total commercial development of 5.73 acres at the intersection. The memo and map indicate plans for:
- A 5,000-square-foot “gas station” with eight pumps
- 10,000 square feet of shopping space
- Two fast-food restaurants totaling 5,500 square feet, and with drive-through lanes
- A two-story, 80,000-square-foot “mini-warehouse” storage facility
Lennar Homes of Texas Land and Construction Ltd. purchased 1.87 acres at the corner on July 28, 2025, where the gas station and a portion of the retail center would be located.
Other acreage of the proposed commercial development is shown as owned by the Amina Living Trust and trustee Saadia Rachik, whose business interests have included multiple Marble Slab and Subway restaurants throughout San Antonio. That portion would hold the fast-food restaurants and storage facility, directly across Scenic Loop from the proposed entrance to Guajolote Ranch. The owner of a smaller third tract is undisclosed.
The memo projects that the commercial development could generate 4,732 daily vehicle “trips,” in addition to an estimated 25,488 daily trips by the Guajolote Ranch residential development itself – for total new traffic of 30,220 trips a day. Currently, two-lane roads there have an estimated capacity of about 5,500 cars a day, in a rural and residential area still designated in San Antonio’s official North Sector Plan as “country.”
Lennar has stated plans to build 2,900 homes on 1,160 acres of Guajolote Ranch, west of the intersection of Scenic Loop and Babcock, though the memo revised the number of homes to 2,700.
“The traffic plan submitted by Pape-Dawson Engineering to accommodate 2,700 new residences and possible commercial development of a gas station and retail space … is, frankly, insane,” Annalisa Peace, executive director of the Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance, wrote in a Jan. 3 piece in the San Antonio Express-News, calling on San Antonio city council to reject a municipal utility district (MUD) for Guajolote Ranch.
“Scenic Loop Road is a two-lane road with no right of way for the option of adding lanes,” she noted. “We ask who is going to pay for the needed road improvements and for a serious analysis of the impacts of an exponential increase in traffic should this project be approved.”
Likewise, Randy Neumann, chair of the steering committee of the Scenic Loop-Helotes Creek Alliance, cites concerns over Scenic Loop becoming a single-corridor evacuation bottleneck, with dire implications for emergency vehicles, wildfire evacuations and school buses, plus added liability for local governments and environmental impacts of the gas station and increased stormwater runoff. The neighborhood alliance as well as two directors of the only existing MUD in the immediate area at San Antonio Ranch also vigorously oppose Lennar’s MUD application.
A widening rift
The Oct. 3 memo, sent to then-county public works director Art Reinhardt who now serves in the same position with the city of San Antonio, overseeing roads and infrastructure, does disclose plans to widen both Scenic Loop and Babcock to four lanes near the intersection and up past the turn to Guajolote Ranch.
It also proposes a new cross intersection extending across Scenic Loop from Guajolote Ranch to the commercial development, as well as multiple single and dual left- and right-hand turn lanes, and traffic signals at both Scenic Loop-Babcock and Scenic Loop-Guajolote Ranch. That is in addition to a previous plan for signals at Babcock-Cielo Vista and Scenic Loop-Cross Mountain Trail once a certain number of homes are built, and restriping for turn lanes at Scenic Loop-Midsomer Place.
The memo was submitted to the county before the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality voted to approve a wastewater permit for Guajolote Ranch on Oct. 22 and declined to take up a rehearing request by Dec. 22, as well as before the MUD application was filed Nov. 10.
The Greater Edwards Aquifer Alliance and the city of Grey Forest, with support from the Scenic Loop-Helotes Creek Alliance, are expected to appeal the TCEQ decision in state district court by the end of January, possibly triggering a prolonged court proceeding. The San Antonio Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on the MUD application on Jan. 16, with city council expected to vote on it on Feb. 5.
Lennar wants to discharge an average of 1 million gallons a day of treated sewage from its development into the Helotes Creek watershed, which directly recharges the Trinity Glen Rose Aquifer, the water supply for the immediate area, and contributes up to 15% of the total recharge of the Edwards Aquifer, principal water source for about 2.5 million people across multiple counties.
In approving the wastewater permit, TCEQ rejected the only accepted science showing what the development would do, a comprehensive hydrological study by Southwest Research Institute funded by the city and concluding that additional wastewater systems from residential development in the Helotes Creek watershed would “significantly degrade the watershed and the quality of water recharging the Edwards Aquifer.”
Notably, Sam Dawson, CEO of Pape-Dawson Engineers, was vice-chair of Southwest Research Institute when the study came out in 2020.
Neumann criticized “the hypocrisy” of the San Antonio Water System, which cited early concerns over possible pipeline breaks over the area’s porous karst geology if it were to provide sewer service to Guajolote Ranch, but no concerns about a wastewater plant discharging effluent over the same ground.
“Now, Lennar wants to build an eight-pump gas station with storage tanks right where the sewer mains would have run,” Neumann said. “Gasoline is far harder to remediate then sewage and spreads quickly in karst.
“So essentially,” he said, “the public narrative is, ‘Sewer line? Too risky for the aquifer. Gas station with thousands of gallons of petroleum? Sure, let’s talk.’ ”
The Scenic Loop-Helotes Creek Alliance is a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) group representing the largest neighborhood by square mile recognized by the San Antonio Neighborhood & Housing Services Department, a wide corridor along Scenic Loop Road from Bandera Road to north of Babcock Road.
Scenic Loop-Helotes Creek Alliance contacts:
Randy Neumann, SL-HCA steering committee chair, 210-867-2826, uhit@aol.com
Steve Lee, 210-415-2402, text; media@scenicloop.org
Lennar’s proposed commercial development with a gas station, retail center, two fast-food restaurants and a two-story, 80,000-square-foot storage facility would be at this rural/residential, two-lane intersection of Scenic Loop and Babcock roads. (Photo by Steve Lee.)