Close to 1,600 housing units could be coming to the Socastee area. Plans to redevelop 197 acres of Socastee Boulevard and Folly Road are back in the works after they were initially rejected last year. 

The plans also call for 80,000 sq ft of commercial buildings along Socastee Boulevard and a Marina Village along the Intracoastal Waterway. 

In the residential area there would be 514 single family and 1,085 multi-family units; totaling 1,599 units. The developer, Mike Wooten of DDC Engineers, agreed the number sounds high, but said during Thursday’s planning commission workshop he does not expect them to reach that density.  

“The odds of us attaining that density, like any PUD (Planned Unit Development) anybody in this county has ever done, are somewhere between slim to none,” he said. “You’d have to go mid-rise on those condos to be that density, and we all know there’s no market for that in this part of Myrtle Beach.”

The plans also call for a 25-foot exterior buffer, a 30-foot buffer between the proposed multi-family section and existing homes along Watergate Dr. and a 15-foot internal buffer between “dissimilar uses.” It also includes 55 acres of open space.

“We think it’s a good plan,” Wooten said. “We think it’s the highest and best use of this property. We believe that with the buffers we’ve put in it’ll be a good neighborhood and good neighbors to the surrounding community.”


If you recall last year, original plans included a market-common type district and a 95 acre campground, and those components received a lot of public backlash. They have been scrapped this time around, but the marina village is still an option.


“Our client listened to the neighborhood, and this is what he’s come back with,” Wooten said. “He feels like that this plan will allow him to generate enough income to pay for the significant amount of infrastructure that’s gonna have to go in.”


Wooten and his team have recruited the company Scantec to complete a traffic study and told planning commissioners whatever that study recommends his client will install. 


You can voice your opinion on the matter at the planning commission’s regular meeting next Thursday, March 1 at 5:30 p.m.