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Chris Cicora, past president of the 7 40 Alliance, said Bear-area residents have been lobbying DelDOT to put the brakes on the project for months. He predicted residents will be pleased with the agency’s decision.

“[DelDOT] had the backbone to stand up to the developer to say, ‘Fine, if you want to put this project in, then you’re going to have to bear the cost of traffic mitigation,’ ” Cicora said.

But Tarabicos maintains DelDOT’s decision contradicts the agency’s history of granting waivers for traffic impact studies to other developers along U.S. 40 and Del. 7.

“DelDOT hasn’t seen a request for a traffic waiver in the Route 40 corridor that they didn’t like — until this one,” Tarabicos said.

Increasing scrutiny

DelDOT’s decision, announced Wednesday in a letter to county land planners, effectively puts the project on hold, Tarabicos said.

The Lowe’s project has been at the center of growing public scrutiny of land-use in the county after The News Journal revealed DelleDonne was seeking the lucrative redevelopment status without tearing down and redeveloping an existing building.

Redevelopment status would have automatically exempted the developer from conducting a traffic impact study and being held liable for improvements for increased congestion for its Governors Square Commercial Center.

In October, DelleDonne withdrew its request for redevelopment status as County Council members and then-County Executive Chris Coons began questioning whether the developer was stretching what constitutes redevelopment.

DelleDonne has proposed constructing a 121,745-square-foot Lowe’s home improvement store, another big box retail store and a restaurant. The developer had requested that DelDOT waive requirements for a traffic impact study, which allows the state to legally require road improvements from developers.

DelDOT engineers concluded the project would

Article source: http://feeds.stateline.org/~r/StatelineorgRss-Transportation/~3/tzJtjd6zuYs/DelDOT-decision-stalls-Governors-Square-project-Bear