The Plan to Develop Crow's Nest

Description of the plan

The preliminary plan proposes 688 single-family dwellings on two parcels totaling 3,230 acres. It is the largest land area of any preliminary plan considered by the County.  The site, zoned A-2, Rural Residential, has a minimum lot size of 1 acre.  Private well and septic systems will serve all dwelling units.

Primary access to the subdivision is provided by existing platted right of ways through the Crow’s Nest Harbour Subdivision from Raven Road , State Route 609. The new subdivision will generate 6,880 vehicle trips per day. Combined with the trips that will be generated by development of the adjacent Crow’s Nest Harbour, this will lead to more than 10,000 more cars a day on Brooke and Raven Roads.

View the plan.

Talking points on the plan

This plan does not protect important cultural resources. An archaeological survey identified 47 new archaeological sites, 14 of which meet the criteria for listing on the National Registrar of Historic Places. All of these sites are located on or near the ridges—right where the roads and houses will be built. View the results of the survey.

Building the plan will require “cut and fill” development practices. The tops of the ridges will have to be bulldozed into the ravines that surround the creeks. With the steep slopes and erodible soils that are on Crow’s Nest, it will be impossible to control the erosion that bulldozing will create. All that dirt will end up in our creeks.

The plan does not adequately identify or protect Critical Resource Protection Areas, the one-hundred buffers that surround perennial (ever flowing) creeks. These buffers play an important role in keeping pollutants like sediment and nitrates from entering creeks.

The stormwater management plan relies on relatively untested “low-impact” methods. Why are we experimenting with these methods on an environmentally sensitive area like Crow’s Nest?

Just look at what has happened at Poplar Hills, which used to be a part of Crow’s Nest. The developers, even with approved soil and erosion and stormwater management plans, have been unable to keep water and dirt off our roads or mud out of our creeks.

All those drainfields on all those one-acre lots are going to end up polluting our creeks. On those steep slopes, what will stop erosion from exposing the drainfield and carrying waste down into the creeks?

Raven Road is a little dirt road, and it feeds into Brooke Road , a winding, rural road. There is not adequate road infrastructure to support all the cars that will be moving in and out of the subdivision. Who is going to pay for that?

The plan shows creeks running through houses and drainfields. How is that going to be built? On stilts? View examples from the plan of houses on creeks and drainfields in wetlands.

This plan does not provide adequate protection for rare and endangered species that live on the Crow’s Nest peninsula, or depend on it for food sources. The entire Potomac Creek area is an important feeding ground for Bald Eagles, and home to the Blue Heron rookery. It is also an important resting stop for migrating birds.