SPRING 2015 COASTAL CONSERVATION LEAGUE n5 Let the People Speak: The State Legislature Takes on Environmental Regulations n7 A Vision for Charleston: Priorities for the Next Mayoral Administration n9 Soul of Generosity: The Lowcountry Legacy of Victor and Marjorie Morawetz SPRING 2015 Richard Beck Richard Staff Dana Beach, Executive Director Programs Lisa Turansky, Chief Conservation Officer PROGRAM DIRECTORS Hamilton Davis Natalie Olson Katie Zimmerman PROJECT MANAGERS Ellie Bomstein Myles Maland SOUTH COAST Kate Parks Schaefer, Office Director Reed Armstrong, Project Manager NORTH COAST Nancy Cave, Office Director COLUMBIA Merrill McGregor, Director of Government Relations Kenneth Sercy, Utility Regulation Specialist GrowFood Carolina Sara Clow, General Manager Jackson Canthen Jessica Diaz Nina Foy Benton Montgomery Alison Pierce Jake Sadler Nate Toth Development Nancy Appel, Director of Development Bea Girndt, Development Associate & Events Manager Nora Kravec, Data Manager Laurin Manning, Membership & Comm. Director Shannyn Smith, Senior Development Officer Administration Tina Allen, Chief Financial Officer Chanta Adams, Clerical Support Erin Crouse, Staff Accountant Tonnia Switzer-Smalls, HR and Administration Louann Yorke, Administrative Assistant Offices Board of Directors Charleston Andrea Ziff Cooper, Board Chair 328 East Bay Street Roy Richards, Vice Chair Charleston, SC 29401 Johnston C. Adams 843.723.8035 Joel A. Berly, III William Cogswell Columbia Ceara Donnelley 1202 Main Street, 3rd Floor Berryman Edwards Katharine Hastie Columbia, SC 29201 Deborah Kennedy Kennard 803.771.7102/803.758.5800 Jeff Leath Pierre Manigault Beaufort Jim McNab 902 North Street Margot T. Rose Beaufort, SC 29902 Richard Schmaltz Tel: 843.522.1800 Jeffrey Schutz Charles M. Tarver Georgetown John Thompson 709-B Front Street David Westerlund Georgetown, SC 29442 Stephen Zoukis Tel: 843.545.0403 Cover Photo by Tom Blagden. Blagden resides in Charleston. Newsletter GrowFood Carolina His book, Acadia National Park: 990 Morrison Drive Laurin Manning, Editor A Centennial Celebration will be Charleston, SC 29403 Julie Frye, Design published in 2016. FROM THE DIRECTOR Richard Beck Richard WHAT A DIFFERENCE DESIGN MAKES: CHARLESTON VS. CANE BAY he term “design” has an insubstantial quality about it. You draw designs on a notepad in a T boring meeting. People who want to make a splash at the Academy Awards wear designer clothes. “Intelligent” design is not really intelligent. Urban design could convey the same lack of seriousness – street trees, a fountain in the park, banners hanging from period lamp posts – all nice but not essential. The Coastal Conservation League’s view, which we’ve promoted for the past 25 years, is exactly the opposite. Urban design will determine whether cities survive and flourish or sink under an un- bearable weight of expense, traffic congestion and pollution. Unfortunately – even catastrophically – local governments, and specifically local planning departments and planning commissions, often times don’t understand or apply even the simplest principles necessary to ensure that development is functional, sustainable, and inspiring. Earth Google Let’s start with the most basic and, arguably, Charleston the most important design element – the street system. As long as cities have existed on this earth, they have had some version of a street grid. This is not just a convention. It is a functional necessity because a grid of streets is demonstrably the most efficient organizational pattern for urban settle- ment. Getting from home to school, from the office to the store, from city hall to the gym, or virtually any point A to any point B, can be done more quick- ly, in a shorter distance, on foot, bicycle, bus, or car, on a grid. This is a geometric fact. Grids vary across the world, from Hong Kong to Athens, from London to San Francisco, from Beau- fort to Savannah. But the unifying principle is that each has a dense, connected network of streets made up of small blocks. Traffic distributes itself across the grid, minimizing congestion. When land uses are blended together, as they are in all tradi- tional cities and towns, it is possible to get around on foot or on a bicycle, because travel distances are Earth Google short. To the right are two examples: Charleston Beaufort and Beaufort. SPRING 2015 | COASTAL CONSERVATION LEAGUE 3 “All of this adds up to an entirely predictable future for this part of the region – massive gridlock, a constant clamor for wider roads, calls for higher taxes to build and maintain those roads, chronically unsafe conditions for bicyclists and pedestrians, and minimal potential for any form of public transit serving the residents.” 1 The Market at Cane Bay 2 Cane Bay High School 3 Cane Bay Middle School 4 Cane Bay Elementary School 5 Palmetto Walk 6 Old Rice Retreat 7 Magnolia 8 Sanctuary Cove 9 The Oaks 10 Lindera Preserve 11 Charleston Atlantic Presbytery 12 The Hammocks 13 YMCA 14 Del Webb 15 Mungo Homes 16 The Coves at Lakes of Cane Bay 17 K. Hovnanian’s Four Seasons Around the 1950s, this pattern began to break down, On the other end of the spectrum, Cane Bay is due to the increasing dominance of the automobile emerging in Berkeley County along Highway 176. At and the false impression that distance was no longer completion this 4,500-acre project is projected to a critical factor in transportation. Blocks lengthened have 10,000 houses and 195 acres of commercial de- and even disappeared among new road layouts that velopment. The first phase is roughly 1.5 square miles. were designed exclusively to accommodate cars. Zon- As you can see in the image above, it is difficult even ing codes rigidly separated different land uses, placing to determine exactly what a block is in Cane Bay, but a stores, offices, and even schools miles from homes. generous count would be 25 total blocks. This adds up By the 1980s, with an exponential increase in traffic to a block density of about 17 per square mile, or about congestion and an ever-increasing demand for more 1/7 that of Charleston. To make matters worse, uses and wider roads, some planners began to realize the are rigidly separated. This means that every trip must catastrophic mistake of abandoning the grid. Ironical- be taken in a car. ly, even cities with internationally acclaimed, historic This disaster-in-the-making is also entirely avoid- downtowns built on traditional street grids – Charles- able. Changing the pattern of new development to ton being a case in point – failed to incorporate reflect the efficiencies of traditional towns is compar- connected streets into new development. The results atively easy … compared to, say, fixing the educational are evident every morning and every evening as traffic system in America or dealing with crime and unem- creeps along major highways nationwide – like I-26 ployment. and Folly Road in Charleston and Highway 278 in Local governments should require that all new de- Bluffton, turning commutes that would ordinarily take velopment meet basic design standards with function- 15 minutes into hour-long ordeals. al road systems that – like Charleston’s, Beaufort’s, There is no secret to the formula for an efficient and Georgetown’s – will support the needs of citizens street system. It all comes down to “block density,” or for centuries into the future. Now is the time to turn the number of blocks per square mile. Charleston, the corner on development by acknowledging and below the Crosstown Expressway, is about 2.8 square institutionalizing the critical importance of design for miles. It contains roughly 320 city blocks. So there are the future of the coast. approximately 114 blocks per square mile. 4 COASTAL CONSERVATION LEAGUE | SPRING 2015 or the last 25 years, the Conservation League has been the leading voice representing the public interest on Lowcountry F environmental issues. In collaboration with communities along the coast, the Conservation League has held developers and legislators accountable for actions that impact the environment. Unfortunately, special interests are using our success to justify one of the biggest attacks on environmental regulatory protections in recent history. The roster of regulatory bills in the state legislature this session, which extends through next year, is aimed almost exclusively at absolv- ing industries and developers from public accountability for the environ- mental consequences of their actions. 1 The Market at Cane Bay 2 Cane Bay High School 3 Cane Bay Middle School Holding Polluters Accountable 4 Cane Bay Elementary School Case in point: Senate bill S.229, dubbed by conservationists as the 5 Palmetto Walk 6 Old Rice Retreat “Polluter Amnesty Bill,” would weaken the Pollution Control Act by 7 Magnolia removing citizens’ rights to legally contest unpermitted, past pollution. 8 Sanctuary Cove This legislation would further prohibit the ability of affected communi- 9 The Oaks 10 Lindera Preserve ties to hold polluting entities accountable and would provide amnesty 11 Charleston Atlantic Presbytery from legal recourse for past pollution, as in the case of leaking coal ash 12 The Hammocks ponds and radioactive waste pools. 13 YMCA 14 Del Webb 15 Mungo Homes 16 The Coves at Lakes of Cane Bay 17 K. Hovnanian’s Four Seasons LET THE PEOPLESPEAK PROTECTING THE AUTOMATIC STAY Next on the docket is S.165, an attack on the “automatic stay,” which is a legal mechanism intended to prevent irreversible and permanent damage to our state’s natural resources. The automatic stay temporarily halts work on a contested project until the Administrative Law Court has heard all of the facts and analyzed the situation to ensure that the initial decision to issue a permit was well-founded and in keeping with state law. Without the automatic stay, destruction can take place unabated until legal proceedings are complete. The automatic stay has prevented great harm in the past, including helping to save Angel Oak on Johns Island.