Sabre Springs, San Diego, CA

Creek trails thread through Sabre Springs, a compact San Diego neighborhood wedged between Interstate 15 and the Poway city line, south of Ted Williams Parkway. Almost nothing stood here before the 1980s. The community plan came in 1982, Pardee Homes opened the first tract in 1985, and building carried on through the 1990s until the area was essentially full by 2010. That timeline means the homes in Sabre Springs are planned tracts from the late 1980s and 1990s, all of a piece. The plan set aside room for jobs too, so a business park with offices and light industry, including General Atomics Aeronautical, shares the neighborhood with the houses. Open space was part of the plan from the start. Two creek corridors run through the neighborhood, following Chicarita Creek and Peñasquitos Creek, and the Peñasquitos path doubles as a leg of the long Trans-County Trail. South Creek Park pairs its ballfield and play area with a trail connection, and Sabre Springs Park has two tot lots and two more ball fields. The recreation center shared with Carmel Mountain Ranch sits just across Ted Williams Parkway. Nutmeg Bakery and Cafe on Sabre Springs Parkway is the area's own breakfast spot, with chocolate croissants and tiramisu cheesecake in the case and stuffed French toast, spicy corned beef hash and chilaquiles on the menu. It closes at 2:30 p.m., so it is a morning and lunch place. Beyond that, eating out and big shopping mostly mean crossing Ted Williams Parkway into Carmel Mountain Ranch, where the grocery stores and big-box centers sit along Carmel Mountain Road. Poway Road cuts through the neighborhood and leads east into Poway, and I-15 forms the western edge. Morning Creek and Creekside elementary schools are both inside, run by the Poway school district. With so few shops of its own, the neighborhood depends on its neighbors for almost everything beyond a pastry and a park. Its streets stay quiet as a result, and a creek trail is usually just around the corner from home.