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(Delaware) Business community eyes Coastal Zone Act change
Business community eyes Coastal Zone Act change
Molly Murray, The News Journal 8:27 p.m. EDT August 13, 2016
Some in the Delaware business community say the 45-year-old legislation limiting heavy industry on the coastline may be an impediment to growth of high-wage manufacturing jobs
On the northern portion of the Delaware River site, in Marcus Hook, work is blazing ahead to turn the former oil refinery into a facility to handle natural gas. Yet steps away, in Delaware, the riverfront has little development.
"You can literally walk ... and on one side ... you see all this building activity. They’re building tanks and all this processing stuff for the Marcellus shale," said Phil Cherry, of the Delaware Division of Energy and Climate, which oversees the development rules. "And on the Delaware side, there’s virtually no activity."
The contrast is a stark visual indicator of how the Coastal Zone Act has shaped what gets built on the state's shorelines. Passed in 1971, the landmark legislation bars new heavy industry and bulk product facilities such as oil refineries, paper mills and coal ports from being developed on a two-mile strip along the state's 115 miles of coastline, both sides of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and a ribbon around Delaware's Inland Bays...
http://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/2016/08/12/business-community-eyes-coastal-zone-act-change/87020446/Molly Murray, The News Journal 8:27 p.m. EDT August 13, 2016
Some in the Delaware business community say the 45-year-old legislation limiting heavy industry on the coastline may be an impediment to growth of high-wage manufacturing jobs
- The Delaware General Assembly passed the Coastal Zone Act four decades ago.
- It limits heavy industry on the Delaware coastline and is seen as critical to preserving the shore.
- Business leaders have quietly started suggesting the plan needs reforms to encourage more projects.
- Nowhere is the impact of the Coastal Zone Act in Delaware more obvious than at the Pennsylvania border, where the massive Sunoco Logistics refinery straddles the state line.
On the northern portion of the Delaware River site, in Marcus Hook, work is blazing ahead to turn the former oil refinery into a facility to handle natural gas. Yet steps away, in Delaware, the riverfront has little development.
"You can literally walk ... and on one side ... you see all this building activity. They’re building tanks and all this processing stuff for the Marcellus shale," said Phil Cherry, of the Delaware Division of Energy and Climate, which oversees the development rules. "And on the Delaware side, there’s virtually no activity."
The contrast is a stark visual indicator of how the Coastal Zone Act has shaped what gets built on the state's shorelines. Passed in 1971, the landmark legislation bars new heavy industry and bulk product facilities such as oil refineries, paper mills and coal ports from being developed on a two-mile strip along the state's 115 miles of coastline, both sides of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and a ribbon around Delaware's Inland Bays...
