Concerned Conway citizens weigh in on project ‘Warden Station’

CONWAY, S.C. (WBTW) – Conway officials said BRD Land and Investment have put in a zoning request for more than 1700 acres on Pitch Landing Road and two Conway residents said they are worried these country roads won’t be able to handle what comes with it.

Debbie Kepley, a Conway local, said the developers are referring to the project as ‘Warden Station’.

The request to annex a large chunk of land on Highway 701, Pitch Landing Road and Blaze Trial were originally discussed during a meeting in July and ended with one neighbor turning to Facebook to express his concerns and he wasn’t alone.

Elaine Kemp, Conway city district resident said he reached out to others.

“I got in touch with him,” Kemp said. “He and I and two other people get together in my dining room and tried to figure out where we could go with this.”

From this conversation a Facebook group called Conway People for Responsible Building was born and now has more than 450 members. The group meets regularly to discuss what can be done to encourage developers to ‘think before they buy or build’.

Group member Elaine Kemp said those meetings typically have upwards of 60 people. She said she is not against growth, but she is against growth without considering who and what is already here.

 Debbie Kepley echoed the sentiment saying being right on the Waccamaw River, she’s worried about the water rising. Especially since the country roads in the area aren’t equipped for the over 3,000 new residents the development would attract.

“Being able to get onto our evacuation routes and our emergency services,” Kepley said. “We have logging trucks that come up and down, all kind of construction vehicles that are already adding to the amount of traffic here.”

The city said the request is still being looked into by G-3 engineering, which has caused the topic to be deferred at two meeting, but they hope to have the final request ready for a meeting on September 7^th.