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Barley Mill Plaza development clears primary hurdle with traffic impact waiver

Courtesy of Pettinaro

A developer’s plans for the former DuPont Barley Mill Plaza office park in Greenville have cleared the biggest hurdle in their approval process. 

 

New Castle County Council voted unanimously Tuesday to excusethe mixed use development at the intersection of Route 141 and Lancaster Pike from certain traffic impact requirements. 

The project by local developer Pettinaro is expected to feature a Wegmanssupermarket, more than 100 residential units, as well as retail and office space. 

A traffic impact studythis spring showed the development would cause several nearby intersections to fail Level of Service requirements, but that fixes for these traffic problems would not be realistic. 

New Castle County’s Land Use Department recommended Council approve the Level of Service waiver — which allows the project to go forward anyway. 

General Manager of Land Use Rich Hall says there is already “significant traffic” in the area, which the Barley Mill Plaza project should only increase it incrementally. He adds that any project there would require a Level of Service waiver.

“So in the scheme of things, will there be more traffic at a couple intersections? Yes. Is it going to be significant? No. So we look at that, balancing the benefits of having that property actually used.”

Hall says the Wilmington University campuson Route 202 was the last development project in the County to utilize a Level of Service waiver. 

Hall says obtaining the waiver was the main discretionary hurdle the Barley Mill Plaza proposal needs to clear —in part because it does not require rezoning. He says the rest of the process will be more routine. 

A previous proposal for the site which did require a rezoning failed, after facing community opposition and a court battle.

 

Sophia Schmidt is a Delaware native. She comes to Delaware Public Media from NPR’s Weekend Edition in Washington, DC, where she produced arts, politics, science and culture interviews. She previously wrote about education and environment for The Berkshire Eagle in Pittsfield, MA. She graduated from Williams College, where she studied environmental policy and biology, and covered environmental events and local renewable energy for the college paper.
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