Sussex County has a once-in-a-generation opportunity to create and implement a vision for how the Del. 1 corridor from Five Points north to Milford will develop over the next 20 years. This opportunity is the result of the Delaware Department of Transportation’s progress in implementing the Corridor Capacity Preservation Program. It would require at most a modest monetary cost to the county but a large investment of political will and courage on the part of county government leaders.
The opportunity? Take full advantage of the department’s vision and the $200 million-plus CCPP investment in Del. 1 improvements now underway in Sussex County by coordinating with the state to develop a long-range plan to ensure that DelDOT’s investment does not result in a development pattern like that south of Five Points. This chance must not be lost.
What should the Del. 1 corridor look like 15-20 years from today? Should it be residential, commercial, industrial, limited- or reduced-access, all of the above? If all of the above, in what proportions and where? What transportation resources will be needed to support that vision? What community resources? Road capacity, both existing and planned, is finite. Who gets that capacity and for what type of development?
The answers to these questions should be developed and enshrined in a “Route 1 Corridor Development Plan” that would be incorporated into the Sussex County comprehensive plan at the earliest opportunity.
This corridor plan, developed with the Transportation Department, the Office of State Planning Coordination and multiple other stakeholders, would utilize broad-based working groups to develop a long-range development plan for the Del. 1 corridor from Five Points north to Milford. This plan would align the desired land uses throughout the corridor with the actual road capacity available on corridor segments and their feeder road systems to complement and fully implement the Corridor Capacity Preservation Program. Such a plan would create a development zone on both sides of Del. 1 to be included in the county comprehensive plan, and the state would utilize its authority under Title 17, Section 145 to limit development in these zones to only that included in the development plan.
Sussex County has repeatedly squandered the opportunity to develop and implement plans for other critical corridors, allowing piecemeal, uncoordinated and often unrelated development to take place without the infrastructure to support it, until the situation is beyond repair. Del. 1 below Five Points is the poster child. This must not be allowed to happen in the corridor between Five Points and Milford.
The most critical issue is that Sussex County must commit to maintaining and enforcing the current comprehensive plan’s land-use designations and zoning in this corridor. The Corridor Capacity Preservation Program’s safety and capacity improvements now being constructed are based on the current land uses in the comp plan. The predominant land-use designation in this corridor is low density and has been for at least two comp plans. Significant deviations from the plan that allow high-density development haphazardly located throughout this corridor will seriously degrade the CCPP’s ability to provide safe and uncongested movement in the corridor.
Unfortunately, Sussex County’s history is one of ignoring comp plans and approving multiple changes to land use without regard to the future consequences. This cannot be allowed to take place in this corridor, and the responsibility for deciding land use rests solely with the Sussex County Council. That is not to say that higher-density development would not be appropriate in various locations in the corridor. But it must be planned and located where it will not compromise the safety and capacity of Del. 1, as has happened in multiple other locations.
The time is now for County Council to be proactive, take action and do the right thing for current and future residents and the thousands of visitors who travel Del. 1 every year. The council must:
• Commit to maintaining the current land-use designations in this corridor until a plan is adopted.
• Initiate a planning process to develop and implement a real and enforceable corridor development plan for Del. 1.
For more information on the Corridor Capacity Preservation Program, go to deldot.gov/projects/vw/corridor-capacity.
Jeff Stone
Sussex Alliance for Responsible Growth
Milton
