Rancho Santa Fe
Santa Fe Land Improvement Company Years
In 1906, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, through its subsidiary Santa Fe Land Improvement Company, acquired the majority of the original Rancho San Dieguito land grant. Through many of its actions, the Company was to leave an indelible mark on the Rancho. Intent on developing a tree farm as a source for railroad ties, the company planted millions of eucalyptus seedlings on the rambling land grant. Frost, drought and the unsuitability of the wood for ties led to the abandonment of the forestry experiment. However, the eucalyptus plantings forever changed the character of the area. What was once a typical Southern California terrace, sage scrub environment was now heavily wooded, rolling hills.

Looking to recoup their losses on the failed timber venture, the Santa Fe Land Improvement Company began the development of a planned community of gentlemen's ranches with a thematic unity of architectural style and an ambiance evocative of the Spanish and Rancho eras.
Towards this end, L.G. Sinnard, a renowned land expert, was hired as manager of the Santa Fe Land Improvement Company in 1921. Sinnard and his staff spent the next five years plotting estate subdivisions and laying out and constructing some fifty miles of winding rural roadways. Also beginning in 1921, all purchasers of Ranch property were required to agree to design controls in the form of deed restrictions.

In 1922, the Company hired the architectural firm of Requa and Jackson to design the downtown Civic Center. Led by architect Lilian Rice, the Civic Center was designed as a mixed use, public/commercial/residential area and developed architecturally in the Spanish Revival style as interpreted by Rice. The architectural tone and style of all future development in Rancho Santa Fe was set by Rice's adaptive creation of a picturesque Spanish village. Rice went on to design many residences in the Ranch and maintained overall design review control on behalf of the Land Improvement Company for many years.
 In 1926, the Santa Fe Land Improvement Company hired Charles Cheney, a nationally renowned city planner and the author of the Palos Verdes Protective Covenant. Building on his previous work, Cheney modified the Palos Verdes document to reflect the larger estate-sized lots, the Hispanic design motif and the influence of citrus agriculture and horsekeeping found in Rancho Santa Fe.
In 1928 Ranch property owners, desiring to maintain the 1921 deed restrictions and the community's developing architectural theme, formally adopted Cheney's Rancho Santa Fe Protective Covenant. The Covenant formally restricted and controlled the use, development and maintenance of all land and improvements within the Ranch in perpetuity. Its adoption marked the culmination of the process of institutionalizing the planned community concept which had originally begun in the form of deed restrictions in 1921.
Based on the original deed restrictions which were aimed at achieving the unifying goals of an articulated master plan, Rancho Santa Fe became one of the first planned communities in California. Rancho Santa Fe is certainly the oldest active California planned community which continues to function with unique broad-reaching powers and authority.

Rancho Santa Fe Association http://www.rsfassociation.org/index2.html