Town expected to follow suit next week

By Ashley May

The Warren Count Board of Supervisors gave its approval Tuesday to the master plan for a 240- acre conservancy park along the South Fork of the Shenandoah River, the first portion of the Avtex site to go through the public planning process.

The Economic Development Authority has already approved the Avtex Conservancy Park Master Plan and had requested the supervisors and the Front Royal Town Council do the same in order to secure federal funds in addition to the $6 Million the EDA has appropriated. The council is expected to approve the plan next week.

Stephen A. Heavener, EDA executive director, said that the plan, which combines ecological restoration and conservation with opportunities for passive recreation, won’t be implemented for another five to 10 years, after other parts of the site are rehabilitated.

For the 240- acre basin area, the plan designates a series of naturalized habitat areas that represent the region’s ecosystems, which will be recreated, the plan says.

Interpretation of the site’s complete history, from prehistoric times to the present, including the story of pollution and on-site remediation and the site’s restored ecology, will be structured around a series of theme trails, it says. The plan provides for boat landings, picnic shelters, and open areas for public passive recreation use.

The EDA, charged by the town and county to oversee the redevelopment of the 500- acre site plans to integrate the 240- acre Shenandoah River Conservancy park, a 25- acre park for soccer fields, a 70- acre passive recreation park on the west river bank, and a 165- acre business park.

The site’s former owner, FMC Corp., hired consulting firm EDAW Inc., of Alexandria, to design the conservancy plan, which is the final product of about 10 months of community and stakeholders meetings, Heavener said.

"Now we’re about to start the exact same thing over the next six months for the business park," he said. Public meetings will begin in the fall, and Heavener said he hopes to have a plan to present for the town and county’s approval in early 2001.

The site is the home of a former rayon manufacturing facility, which was first operated by the American Viscose Co., from 1940 to 1963 and then by FMC Corp., form 12963 to 1976. Avtex Fibers operated from 1976 to 1989, when the plant was shutdown for financial, environmental and safety reasons.

Because of pollution from plant operations, the Avtex site was designated a federal Superfund site by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1986.

Over 100 acres of waste basins are located in the conservancy park plan area, where sulfate sludge, fly ash and viscose have leached into soil and ground water.

The basins will be cleaned up and capped as part of the remediation process, and environmentally friendly vegetation will create open space in the reclaimed area.

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