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Plantation owners plan for Ridgeland annexation that would lead to conservation-friendly development

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RIDGELAND -- A representative of the 15,500-acre Good Hope Plantation confirmed last week that the landowners are "seriously considering annexation" into Ridgeland to be part of a newly created conservation district zoning.

Such a district allows about one home per 4 acres and is designed to encourage development like Palmetto Bluff, a 20,000-acre gated community in Bluffton that has won awards for environmental stewardship.

The Good Hope developers have been in talks with the nonprofit environmental group Coastal Conservation League about the development, said Richard Webel, a member of the land-owning family.

Dana Beach, director and founder of the Coastal Conservation League, said he and Webel hope the development sets an example and highlights an alternative to "squeezing every unit and square foot of commercial space" out of municipal councils.

The Ridgeland Town Council created conservation protection districts in January. Among other restrictions, the ordinance states:

• Only contiguous land of at least 500 acres can be zoned as a conservation preservation district

• At least half the acreage must be open space

• Overall housing density is limited to one unit per 4 acres

• Commercial space must be pedestrian friendly and no more than 2 percent of the total acreage.

Ridgeland Mayor Henry Moss said the new zoning allows development similar to Palmetto Bluff. About a third of that community is open space, and homes are for sale beginning at $1.2 million, according to its Web site.

Good Hope Plantation stretches from S.C. 462 east to the Broad River. It straddles the Beaufort-Jasper county line and has historically been used for timber and recreation.

Under Jasper County zoning, the plantation is limited primarily to agricultural uses, housing at a density of up to one home per acre and golf courses. Beaufort County's zoning of its chunk of Good Hope Plantation emphasizes environmental and historical conservation, forbidding most development.

Webel said the Ridgeland Town Council's annexation of the 11-square-mile tract developers are calling Genesis Landing, which pushed the town limits east to S.C. 462 near Good Hope Plantation, a wake-up call to the Good Hope landowners and others in Jasper County.

Over about 30 years, developers plan to build 15,000 homes and 1.6 million square feet of light industry at Genesis Landing, which covers a land area seven times that of the town's size in 2002.

Good Hope Plantation's conservation-minded owners didn't want to wake up one day surrounded by sprawl, Webel said, and hope they can steer some conservation and development toward a balanced, more "sane" direction.

Webel said the plantation's landowners do not have development plans pending.

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