Edwards Forest Heights offers quiet life

The few that do pop up don't usually stay up long.

That's because residents say the quiet, established neighborhood not far off Wade Hampton Boulevard in Taylors is the perfect place to live.

"I don't have any desire to live anywhere else," said Bill Clifton, a retired pharmacist who has lived in Edwards Forest Heights with his wife, Garnell, for more than three decades.

"It's just a nice neighborhood. I don't think you'd find one any better," he said.

Gary Ricker, an architect, built the first house in the neighborhood in 1967.

"Back then, it was nobody but me. The roads were still dirt," he said. "I wanted to be out, but not too far out."

Soon, the lots around him were filled with a variety of homes, ranging from stately two-stories and split levels to rustic ranches. Now, it has around 75 homes and just a smattering of empty lots. Most of the empty lots were purchased by neighboring homeowners to enlarge their yards.

Most of the construction took place between 1967 and the late 1980s.

The neighborhood lives up to the "forest" in its name with a plethora of towering hardwoods and large shaded lots, many speckled with flower gardens in various stages of bloom.

In the spring and summer, the leaves on the trees provide the privacy that comes from fences in other neighborhoods, said Doris Coble, who has lived in the neighborhood for more than three decades.

With the forest comes wildlife. Whippoorwills can be heard at night and it's common to see robins, blue jays, cardinals, Carolina wrens, finches and hummingbirds.

Hawks and owls are not uncommon sights.

The "heights" comes from its many hills.

Coble lives on one of the neighborhood's steepest hills.

It's a hill that neighborhood children love to sled down when it snows, she said.

Coble and her husband, Ed, looked at two areas when they moved to Greenville - Terra Pines and Edwards Forest Heights.

They had just built a house in Asheville when Ed changed jobs. The opportunity to re-build the same house on one of Edwards Forest Heights' empty lots was the clincher.

"I'm so glad we built here," she said.

Traffic in the neighborhood is almost non-existent.

"Unless you have business here, you really don't have to come in here," she said. "That's a real nice feature."

The neighborhood boasts a mix of empty-nesters who moved to the neighborhood when their children were small, older families with teenagers, and a few families with young children.

"It keeps the neighborhood alive," Coble said.

It is home to professionals, self-employed and retired folks. It's home to native Greenvillians and transplants from the North.

Kathy and Randy Phoenix moved into the neighborhood last year after Randy retired from a police force in Upstate New York.

They looked all over.

Their criteria: something in the Eastern time zone, away from hurricanes, close to the mountains and something with four seasons, although they preferred winters not as harsh as New York winters.

They found what they were looking for in Edwards Forest Heights.

The houses weren't cookie-cutter. The yards were big and houses were well-maintained. It was close to shopping and dining. It was close to many main roads that would take them anywhere they wanted to go.

"Every day, I like it better," Kathy Phoenix said.

And, it's quiet.

On a recent spring evening, the only sound came from a leaf-blower.

"There's lots of leaves, lots of tassels," said Joyce Harris, who moved into the neighborhood three years ago when she married longtime resident A.J. Harris.

"I think the beauty outweighs the labor to get the leaves up," A.J. said.

And the people are friendly, said Frank Sutherland, a former Wade Hampton High teacher and principal at Baker's Chapel Elementary.

It's a place where neighbors watch out for each other, he said.

"I'm not moving anywhere," he said.