Two decades ago, the “small” residential lots in Manteca developments were pushing 8,000 square feet.

It wasn’t unusual for new neighborhoods to have a half  a dozen or so lots ranging from 11,000 to 14,000 square feet.

Homes also were being built with more than 4,000 square feet with the biggest tract homes of the era topping out at 4,600 square feet.

The days of larger tract housing lots are clearly numbered.

Exhibit “A” is the 827-lot Lumina at Machado Ranch neighborhood that’s before the Manteca Planning Commission Thursday at 6 p.m. when they meet at the Manteca Civic Center.

The project by Pleasanton-based Signature Homes involves annexing 157.53 acres to Manteca primarily southwest of the Airport Way and Woodward Avenue intersection.

The “big lots” number 37 and come in at 8,000 square feet.

There are 120 lots of 6,000 square feet — the default standard of tract lots in Manteca in the 1960s and 1970s.

The rest of the lots approach the size of many in older sections of central Manteca where homes were built in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s.

There are 202 lots of 5,000 square, 207 lots of 4,000 square feet, and 109 lots of 3,375 square feet.

But the smallest — as well as most intriguing — are 77 “motor court” lots. They will be the smallest tract lots ever in Manteca with most planned to be as small at 2,746 square feet.

They are even smaller because four homes share a common area. It’s a 20-foot wide driveway from the street serves four homes that have driveways 18 feet deep that split off the motor court driveway.

Guest parking is allowed on driveway aprons as well as on the street.

All landscaped areas in front of the two homes facing the motor court as well as the two homes facing the street are maintained by a homeowners’ association.

The individual lots have minimum widths of 40 feet and minimum depths of 45 feet.

California Rooms — indoor-outdoor living spaces designed as a seamless extension of a great room — are included in the motor court homes and may encroach up to 3 feet into the backyards.

A large 9.6-acre park central to the new neighborhood will include a number of standard items as well as a recreational sports field and a pickleball court. There also will be a 1.2-acre park along a dry leeve on the southern boundary of the project.

Not part of the subdivision per se but included in the annexation proposal are six existing homes north of Woodard Avenue to the west and another nine existing homes along the northwest corner of Woodward Avenue and Airport Way. Under San Joaquin Local Agency Formation rules annexations can’t create islands hence the inclusion of the 15 homes.

Bella Terra Drive will extend south to create the only access to Lumina from Woodward Avenue. Two streets in the Terra Ranch project that border the project will be extended into Lumina.

There will be two streets that access Airport Way. The main entrance, which is closest to Woodward Avenue, will have a roundabout.

There are no access roads to the south as the project bumps up against the cross levee also known as a dry levee.

The proposed zoning for the six homes to the west on Woodward would be residential. The nine existing lots on the northwest corner of Airport Way and Woodward are almost all envisioned as commercial general with the largest parcel being proposed for commercial mixed-use zoning.

The subdivision would be built in four phases.

The area being developed is farmland except for two existing houses as well as barns and sheds.

The development will trigger the installation of traffic signals at Woodward Avenue and Airport Way.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com