GEORGETOWN, Del. - Carl M. Freeman Companies wants to build a hotel and a restaurant along Route 54. The developers say their project would make significant infrastructure improvements, but Planning and Zoning previously denied the application. Neighbors in the Fenwick Island area filled Sussex County Council chambers for several hours on Tuesday, voicing their concerns in a public hearing.
The Carl M. Freeman Companies group wants a conditional use approval to build its planned hotel and restaurant. The developer says their plan would fit in with the other commercial districts nearby, but neighbors say there's already too much traffic on Route 54.
Nancy Flacco represents the Southern Sussex County Community Action Group. She says they're not against development, they just worry how this one would impact safety and the environment.
"When we have hurricanes and nor'easters and with heavy rain, there's no place for the water to go," Flacco says. "The emergency evacuation for Sandy, people sat for hours in the car trying to evacuate."
"There were no federally listed or threatened endangered species or habitat listed with the site," the developer's attorney says.
The developer says it worked with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to confirm that. It also says the soil has been tested to confirm that they'd be developing uplands, not wetlands.
"One of the few exceptions to that being in the hundred year flood plane is the majority of this 9-acre parcel, it's not in the flood zone," the developer's attorney says.
The plan would develop 2.93 acres of uplands and preserve 4.32 acres of wetlands. The Carl M. Freeman Companies say they'd also provide the 50-foot tidal wetland buffer required by the county and make a stoplight, but some locals aren't convinced.
"People coming over the bridge, won't have a reaction time," says Kenneth Hahn of Fenwick Island. "They're going to come flying over the bridge, won't have a reaction time. You know, they're going to come flying over the bridge over the Harpoon Hannah's Ditch and they're going to have stopped vehicles in front."
The developer says it is working with DelDOT to improve the roadway.