Vote delayed on Tidewater Landing site plan
The developer of Tidewater Landing – a 213 single-family subdivision along Robinsonville Road near Lewes – will have to wait another week for Sussex County planning and zoning commissioners to act on the final site plan.
The hold up is over the county's buffer regulations. County staff says the developer must provide a 20-foot landscaped buffer around the perimeter of the 163-acre community; a section of the plan does not show the required buffer.
Tom Ford, a land-use planner representing the developer, says a proposed 500-foot deep farm field backing up to woods along the front of the property serves the same purpose and meets the standards of the county's buffer regulations.
Ford said the first lots in the community would be at least 700 feet from Robinsonville Road.
He said the intent of the county's ordinance is to reduce the visual impact of a subdivision along a roadway. “It's interpretation of the code that we are at odds with,” he said. “We want to provide a pastoral landscape and will not need the landscaped buffer.”
He said the communty's amenities have been moved away from the field and placed in the back of the property.
Commissioner Marty Ross said he did not see an issue with the proposal. “Our rules are not meant to block innovation,” he said.
However, assistant county attorney Vince Robertson cautioned the commission that the proposal has the potential to open flood gates for other developers.
Robertson said buffers have been an ongoing issue in the county. “The commission should not say open space counts as a buffer just because someone says it does. There have to be clear reasons why it makes sense,” Robertson said.
“We have to provide reasons specific to this site or there is the potential for a parade of people coming in here,” said Commission Chairman Bob Wheatley.
Ford said the open space along the front of the property is similar to developments along Gills Neck Road. “The large open space in front preserves a quality of Sussex County we are losing. Many developers change the rural, pastoral character of Sussex County. When we can, we should try to preserve it,” he said.
The commission approved a revised site plan in April 2015 with a 40-percent reduction in density, and county council recently granted the developer a sixth-month time extension to get the project underway.
A vote on the site plan will occur during the commission's Thursday, Aug. 25 meeting, which starts at 6 p.m. in the county administration building, 2 The Circle, Georgetown.
