MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – The Horry County Planning Commission decided against giving approval to plans for a large development along the Intracoastal Waterway in Socastee on Thursday night.
The plan proposed to the county includes a marina, restaurants, homes, and campground sites to be built off of Highway 707 and Folly Road. People who live in the neighboring communities, however, aren’t happy about the potential development.
The planning commission rejected original plans back in March after Socastee community members filled the meeting in opposition to the project. Horry County leaders said there were too many issues for them to approve the plan.
On Thursday the developer tried to alleviate some of those concerns by updating the plans with no ingress or egress into the development from Folly Road and doubling the size of barriers for the neighborhood.
Neighbors who were at the meeting in March, came out to Thursday night’s meeting hoping for a second refusal.
“Our hope is to get another recommendation for a denial,” expresses Michelle McGee, co-owner, Folly Estates.
McGee opposes rezoning the 175 acres into a planned development district, noting that with RVs and tourist type destinations, her neighborhood will fill with transients, which is not what their community wants.
“It’s unfair of them to expect all the long term residents around here to be ok with bringing in transient people where we don’t know from week to week or even day to day whose in our front and back yards,” states McGee.
McGee is also worried about the extra traffic and noise right next to the neighborhood.
“This is not going to only impact Watergate Road and Folly Drive, this is going to impact anyone who drives up 707,” predicts McGee.“Their main access on and off 707 would create that much more traffic. With 95 acres of campgrounds, we’re talking about 500 RVs in this property. So if you can imagine 500 trying to come in and 500 trying to get out on 707 it’s just not going to work.”
McGee started a petition opposed to the development. It originally got 200 signatures, but has since grown.
“There are people on the other side of the waterway who are concerned about how this development is also going to impact them along the Burcale and Arrowhead side,” claims McGee.News13 did attempt to reach the developer prior to the meeting, but he did not return those calls.
At the 5:30 meeting, the Folly Road project was not approved by the planning commission.
“We feel very good we feel like our voices are being heard,” said McGee.
Ross Harris who also opposes development said, “they’ve already denied it twice now so we feel like we have a good shot at stopping something that no permanent resident wants in there back yard.”
Horry County Council can still approve the plans against the recommendation of the planning commission, but concerned neighbors say they’ll continue to fight the project.