Laurel Redevelopment

Laurel, a historic Sussex County town of 3,835 on a tributary of the Nanticoke River, faces economic challenges.  However, its Broad Creek waterfront is a striking and valuable natural asset.  The successful Laurel Redevelopment Corporation and local stakeholders, including town leaders, partnered on a sweeping plan and proposal to revitalize Laurel’s waterfront while safeguarding water quality in the creek.

The Sustainable Coastal Communities Initiative, a landscape design professor from UD’s College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, and a grduate student in public policy collaborated on the plan.  Three specific objectives for the project were:

• To improve the sense of connectedness through a user-friendly greenway extending between existing Creekside and Riverview parks.
• To design a highly visible residential project, consistent with the architectural style of the town and ecological restoration values.
• To propose a mixed-use design alternative for Thompson Block, to be included in the long-term vision of the Laurel Redevelopment Corporation.

The detailed proposal and conceptual drawings are available for download below.  Commercial and residential redevelopment would retain and enhance the green infrastructure throughout the waterfront area – minimizing new development in a flood zone and the the potential for pollution of the waterway.

 FINAL LAUREL DOCUMENT LS 09 17 14.pdf      (Please note: this file is 112 MB!)

View the final site plan below.

laurel_final_site_plan_bruck_sep14.pdf

Click the following links to read UDaily features on the Laurel project!

http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2014/may/sea-grant-laurel-050714.html

http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2015/oct/laurel-ramble-100814.html