Wagoner: “The village has some great bones”
ROCK HILL – In response to the anticipated influx of new visitors that will be coming to Sullivan County as a result of major projects under development including the Veria Wellness Center, Montreign Resort/Casino and new waterpark, the county is positioning itself to be able to encourage those visitors to stay and spend money elsewhere in the local area, rather than just coming to one of those attractions, then leaving immediately afterward.
The Sullivan County Partnership for Economic Development held an interactive information session on Wednesday focusing on what the county is calling the Thompson-Monticello Gateway Strategic Plan.
This plan, although still in its preliminary stages, has already received a $67,000 USDA grant.
Senior Planner and Project Manager for Elan Planning, Design & Landscape Architecture, Nicolette Wagoner, the company commissioned to develop the strategic plan, said the idea is going to be realizing a way to get those new visitors to travel through the local areas between exits 104 and 107 off Route 17, rather than bypass them.
“We’re talking about how to take advantage of that and how to improve the quality of place; so, to attract people who are coming out of the casino to have them turn right into the village, instead of to turn left,” said Wagoner. “The village has some great bones. There’s some beautiful buildings. The streetscape is nice, but how do you attract people to go there, park their cars and spend money.”
Participants were encouraged to post ideas on the map with Post-its
Sullivan County Planning Commissioner Freda Eisenberg said this plan is going to be especially crucial because the corridor acts as a both a gateway to the Thompson and Monticello area, as well as the county itself.
“It’s where people will be coming in to the major attraction that’s being built here,” Eisenberg said. It’s where people already come in when they want to go to Bethel Woods or the western part of the county; so, it’s really a central area and it’s a great opportunity that we’re looking at it.”
Even though Wagoner said there is still a lot of information gathering to be done, what they have already found is that a recurring input is to stick to the area’s existing strengths, something with which Sullivan Partnership President Mark Baez agrees. However, Baez said they want to take it a step further seizing the opportunity to do some higher level business that they previously did not have the opportunity to do.
“We’re going to be able to attract the types of investment, the quality investment, that we haven’t been able to do in years past, due to the fact that we didn’t have the extraordinary project going on nearby,” said Baez. “Now that we do, and the county’s been successful in planning the casino and the water park and the Veria project, we now have an ability to attract a little higher caliber of a customer base.”
On February 15th, there will be an all-day open house event at the Monticello Library regarding the corridor’s strategic plan.
Eisenberg maintains it’s still too early to speculate on potential developmental costs following the plan’s completion, but Elan expects to have the plan finished in late summer/early fall of 2017.
