ABOVE: Developer Ed Mitchell (right) and marketing director Rich Hudson review the 

 location of a 28-acre inland marina. Its 560,000 cubic yards of sand will be used within the 

 project. RIGHT: Survey flags mark the natural buffer line that rings the River Dunes peninsula. 



of state agencies that oversee coastal management, 

 water quality and water resource matters. "I asked 

 a lot of questions," he says. 



Then, he hired the nationally renowned 

 Land Ethics, Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich., to design 

 a conceptual site plan that would meet economic 

 and environmental goals. The design disturbs 

 less than an acre of wetland and sets impervious 

 surface goals at 12 percent for the site. There 

 are no curbs and gutters to channel rain into 

 stormwater drains that lead to water bodies. 

 Instead, roadbed grading will enable water to flow 

 in sheets into swales and vegetated shoulders, then 

 drain through sandy soils into the water table. 



"It was an impressive plan. But there still 

 were some water resources issues that needed to 

 be addressed. That's when we invited the Clean 

 Water Management Trust Fund folks in to discuss 

 the possibility of a grant to help offset the cost 

 of eliminating house sites in the Gum Thicket 

 watershed," Miller explains. 



Discussions led to a $1.25-million Clean 

 Water Management Trust Fund (CWMTF) grant 

 to NCCF, NRF and Weyerhaeuser to permanently 

 protect nearly 238 acres of wedands and water- 

 shed. The Gum Thicket site plan was reworked to 

 move homesites out of the conservation area. 



"We saw a great opportunity to work with a 

 developer and two conservation organizations to 

 create an environmentally sensitive community at 

 River Dunes," says Holman. 



At the signing ceremony, 

 Marion Smith, former executive 

 director of the Neuse River 

 Foundation, declared that the 

 partnership "establishes a new 

 benchmark for environmentally 

 compatible development on the North Carolina 

 coast." 



The transaction took place in 2001 , just 

 before Weyerhaeuser conveyed the Gum Thicket 

 property to Granite Investment Properties. In 

 April 2004. Mtchell and his partners, Jim Adams, 

 Jim Goldston and Kenny Goetze, purchased the 

 property from Granite for $ 1 2 million — and 

 River Dunes officially was launched. 



It's an appropriate name change, Mitchell 

 points out, because part of the tract is comprised 

 of an ancient dune line. Besides, he adds. Gum 

 Thicket doesn't have a marketing ring to it. 



INNOVATIVE SOLUTIONS 



Buffered shorelines facing the sound and 

 river will be kept natural. Individual boat slips 

 in front of houses are prohibited to protect water 

 quality and aesthetics. 



So, if the boats can't anchor along the 

 shoreline that outlines the peninsula, where will 

 they go? A tour of the River Dunes property 

 provides the answer. 



Mitchell's SUV hugs the slope of the tree- 

 lined "parkway" as a parade of giant earthmovers 



lumbers in the opposite direction. The narrow 

 construction road fans out into an excavation site 

 larger than eight football fields. There, a well- 

 choreographed assembly line of earthmovers, 

 bulldozers and compacters are digging, scraping 

 and transporting sand from the site. 



Their task is to create a 28-acre inland 

 marina eight feet deep, which will satisfy state 

 water quality and fisheries agencies' requests to 

 "keep the boat slips out of the sensitive waters" 

 and "avoid 250 individual boat slip permits." 



Instead, the manmade marina requiring a 

 single permit will accommodate 400 boat slips. 

 Floating docks will hug its 1 .7-mile living shore- 

 line, where about 190 homes will be clustered. 

 In addition, the clubhouse front door will open to 

 the marina, while its back porch will overlook a 

 salt marsh — and the Pamlico Sound beyond. 



Once the basin is completed, a channel will 

 be dredged to link the marina to Broad Creek 

 and the nearby Intracoastal Waterway. 



Along with protecting sensitive sound, river 

 and creek waters, the inland marina provides a 

 safe harbor in storms — a valuable asset. 



Continued 



COASTWATCH 9 



