MAPLETON — A man who owns a chunk of Maple Mountain is laying plans to build up to 20 palatial hillside houses despite efforts by City Hall to keep the pristine hillside free from growth.

The battle over hillside construction is the latest tiff between city officials and Wendel Gibby, one of five landowners of mountain acreage who have building rights.

Mayor Dean Allan acknowledges Gibby could develop his land on Maple Mountain "if he meets all the criteria" for city-approved construction.

That would include building roads at less than a 30 percent grade and putting in utility lines to carry water, sewer and power to the homes.

The rest of the mountain landowners have traded in their building rights for certificates of "Transfer of Development Rights." Many have sold those certificates to developers who used them to increase the number of homes they can build per acre in certain valley floor neighborhoods.

In Mapleton, landowners can get five TDRs if they deed their property to the city so that construction will never take place. They get three "TDRs" if they keep the land and give up the building rights.

The certificates bring from $22,000 to $25,000 each.

One of the "receiving areas" — land where more homes can be built per acre — lies on the west side of town where developer Boyd Adams is building nearly 500 homes on the smallest lots ever allowed in Mapleton.

The subdivision, called Harvest Park, last month won Envision Utah's Grand Achievement Award. The planning think tank lauded the project for saving hundreds of hillside acres from development. But at least half those acres were too steep to be developed anyway, former City Councilman Don Walker said.

Adams bought 50 "TDRs" from Mark Sheranian, who got 52 of them from his 100 acres on Maple Mountain, city records show.

Some of the slopes on the hillside property exceeded 30 percent, which deemed it unbuildable, resident David Taylor said.

In the case of steep land, more acreage is required to get the certificates, Allan said. Land with a greater-than-30-percent grade requires 20 acres to get a "TDR," city planner Mat Evans said. Land not that steep yields one "TDR" per every 3 acres, he said.

Both Taylor and Walker are critical of the way the ordinance is used to create dense neighborhoods in a town where the usual acreage is at least 1/3 acre. Many residents own an acre or more.

Mapleton Justice Court Judge Dean F. Olsen earlier this year found Gibby guilty of unlawful plowing. Following a one-day, 19-hour marathon misdemeanor trial, the judge said Gibby illegally graded his hillside land in a sensitive environmental zone, graded it without a permit and graded a slope greater than 30 degrees — all prohibited by city ordinance.