By Hunter Hine, Staff Writer

Titan Custom Yachts project set for construction on Old Stage Road in Bishopville

The Worcester County Planning Commission on Nov.2 approved the site plan for a 13,600-square-foot boat-building facility at Titan Custom Yachts in Bishopville.

The planning commissioners unanimously voted to accept the facility site plan, which was submitted by the applicant RLG Properties, an LLC that owns Titan Custom Yachts on Old Stage Road, said Russell Garufi, president and founder of Titan Custom Yachts, after the meeting.

Garufi described the building as a new boat fabrication shop.

The building is set to be constructed on Parcel 59 of the Worcester County tax record, and it also includes plans for 14 parking spaces, construction material storage areas, surrounding roads, septic and stormwater management.

The Worcester County Technical Review Committee voted to recommend approval of the site plan to commissioners at the committee’s Oct. 11 meeting. Committee members added conditions for minor changes.

One such condition was to make sure that there is space for an additional septic system in the future, since that will be required if owners want to add buildings to the property beyond the new boat shop, Garufi said. For now, the new building will be connected to the property’s existing septic system, he said.

“We still have a lot of land to build on, and in the future we’ll be developing another part of it,” Garufi said.

Titan’s 59.21-acre property already contains three buildings for boat building, maintenance, storage and office space.

Vista Design Inc., an engineering consultant company from Showell that is designing the project, requested and recieved 11 waivers of county design guidelines.

Vista’s request for waivers says that the building is meant for industrial uses only, and because it will be surrounded by a more than 250-foot forest buffer, it won’t be visible to the public or neighboring properties. County design standards meant to accommodate the public are therefore unnecessary, according to the arguments for the waivers.

The requests include waivers for code sections that mandate the screening of utilities, set restrictions for external lighting, prohibit the storage of vehicles, order the inclusion of irrigation systems and require ornamental landscaping.

Zoning Administrator Kristen Tremblay said that now the applicants have to make revisions based on the Technical Review Committee’s comments and resubmit the plans for a second review. Then committee members can decide whether to grant a final approval.

The project required a major site plan, since it included a building exceeding 10,000 feet. Major site plans require approval from both the Technical Review Committee and the Planning Commission per the county code.