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Expansion pushing out farther into rural landscape
By Kathleen Dayton
Staff Writer
Michael Hielscher is a long way from Denmark. Living in a $650,000 home surrounded by moss-covered live oaks and the wilderness known as Caw Caw Swamp is what the Scandinavian native calls “getting away from everything.”
“We like the privacy,” Hielscher said of his Dorchester County home in Boyle Plantation. “There’s no city noise. We have a lot of deer. We just want to have peace.”
For now, the upscale, 60-unit development on rural S.C. Highway 165 can certainly be called a getaway. Boyle Plantation is far from the sights and sounds of commercial development and is one of only a two residential developments along this forlorn stretch of highway linking Summerville and Ravenel.
Will the peace and quiet in this area last?
Just a couple of miles away in the direction of Summerville, The Legends subdivision is building its fifth phase off S.C. 165. The subdivision’s first phase fronts along S.C. Highway 61 and recently turned the corner where the two rural roads intersect. Summerville High School is planning a new facility nearby.
“They’re building the new high school across the street, so something else will come in,” Hielscher said. “I think they will have to build some shopping centers and all of that. I’m not sure how much they will build.”
Hielscher thinks his little patch of paradise is safe from sprawl because of nearby wetlands.
Economist Al Parish, director of the Center For Economic Forecasting at Charleston Southern University, thinks Hielscher could be right.
“You could have development potentially, but 165 is the type of road that cannot support a whole lot of development,” Parish said. “It’s a two-lane highway that’s not lit. It’s very, very dark at night and there are not very many straight segments between Ravenel and Summerville. The trees grow very close to the road.”
The highway would have to be widened to support more development, and that would be nearly impossible, Parish said.
“That area is very wet,” he said. “It is a swamp. The environmental damage would be too big.”
Conservationist approach
Not far away on S.C. 61, conservation groups and proponents of the Ashley River Historic District overlay worked with developers to scale down plans for Watson Hill, a residential project that backs up to Boyle Plantation.
Poplar Grove, another project south of Watson Hill, was scaled back from 3,500 houses to 450 homes.
Will Haynie, executive director of the Lowcountry Open Land Trust, said scaled-down projects where land is placed under conservation easements could work for both the developer and conservationists.
“Forty or fifty homes is not going to change the rural nature of a community the way 3,000 or 4,000 homes would,” Haynie said. “Those can be better for the Lowcountry than the alternative: mass development of many homes. Sometimes the numbers can work just as well for the person who owns the land.”
Such arrangements, Haynie said, should be careful not to abuse the tax benefits landowners get for conservation easements.
“The preserved area itself can be an amenity and the whole basis of the tax deduction is that the landowner has given away something,” Haynie said. “The appraiser has got to decide the giveaway value versus how much of it was enhanced.”
Other parts of Dorchester County will likely see more development than S.C. 165, especially the area served by Interstate 26. A number of housing developments have been proposed for the Ridgeville area, about 12 miles outside of Summerville.
Dorchester County planning director Harold LeaMond said that Ridgeville, Harleyville and St. George all have their own infrastructure, so there is potential for more development around those municipalities.
Explosive growth
Residents and county officials still are worried about traffic issues and the capacity of the school system.
Dorchester County residents made their voices heard at a recent public meeting where they opposed a rezoning request from Carolina Land Investors of Charleston and Throwerwood LLC that would allow the county to provide sewer service for a 1,000-acre tract near Ridgeville.
LeaMond said Dorchester County is the fastest growing county in the state.
“The amount of growth we’ve seen in this area has been phenomenal over the past 10 years, very similar to the way Mount Pleasant grew so quickly,” LeaMond said. “We’re dealing with the same problems they’re dealing with as well. The price of housing has skyrocketed around here.”
Lide Bailey, a real estate agent with Prudential Carolina in Summerville, said he has sold 55 of 60 home sites in Ridgeville’s Winterseat development and will start selling lots Nov. 1 at Carolina Bay on Carter Road. In the Lebanon community, Bailey is selling four-acre lots in an upscale community called The Farm.
Bailey sees more development coming.
“Cypress Campground Road runs between Summerville and Goose Creek, so you’re going to see that area explode.” Bailey said. “It’s just that we’re out of lots in Summerville. Urban sprawl is what it is.”
Bailey has a listing in Boyle Plantation and said some buyers in the area are coming from Mount Pleasant and other places where property values have risen quickly, he said.
“They’re taking their profits out of their houses in Mount Pleasant and they’re rolling them over here,” Boyle said.
The lower cost of land in more rural areas will continue to bring developers out to the far edges of the tri-county region, Parish said, although water and sewer are issues in some areas.
Rural areas where subdivisions couldn’t have been imagined a few years ago are now hot spots for development. Those include Red Top, Rantowles Creek and Awendaw in Charleston County; Ridgeville, Knightsville and the border of Colleton and Dorchester counties; the Carnes Crossroads region; and Moncks Corner in Berkeley County.
180,000 new homes by 2026?
Cane Bay Plantation and The Parks at Berkeley, two developments facing each other on S.C. Highway 176 in Berkeley County, have more than 23,000 homes on the drawing board. The Daniel Island Co. is also developing a 2,500-acre tract.
There are 180,000 homes planned for the tri-county area in the next 20 years, Parish said, but that does not mean all will come to fruition.
Developers could be tempted with even more rural tracts if MeadWestvacao decides to sell some or all of its more than 300,000 acres of timberland in South Carolina. MeadWestvaco officials recently announced they are considering a sale as the company reviews its assets.
“That’s why you see in Berkeley, Dorchester, Charleston and Georgetown counties large holdings that used to belong to the paper company and now are being proposed for development. When we got into a more paperless society and the recycling of paper, the need for these vast resources declined,” said Dan Pennick, Charleston County’s assistant planning director.
Where land is cheaper but infrastructure is sparse, developers are finding a niche market in high-end, executive homes geared toward equestrian and nature lovers.
David Hodson, of Properties of the Carolinas, said his company is getting a good response to Oaks Preserve, a 239-acre tract of forestland just south of McClellanville and about halfway between Mount Pleasant and Georgetown.
The gated community plans only 23 home sites. Amenities include a covered, lighted horse riding facility and two turnout paddocks.
“We wanted to do a development that we felt was in keeping with the environment and also provide some acreage,” Hodson said.
The lack of nearby supermarkets, hospitals and movie theaters hasn’t made buyers hesitate. Hodson said eight of the 23 parcels have been reserved.
“There’s the buyer who just wants a getaway place,” Hodson said. “Maybe it’s a buyer who loves nature and can’t afford a 200-acre plantation.”
Hodson doesn’t think Oaks Preserve will attract commercial development to the area in the manner of traditional subdivisions.
“We’re basically one resident per 10 acres,” Bailey said. “With only 23 homes, you won’t attract a Food Lion.”
Kathleen Dayton is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail her at kdayton@charlestonbusiness.com.
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