Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

The community of Eggleston in Giles County is one of the older communities on the river. Now newer structures are showing up along the river.

Video

• Following the river -- from wild and scenic to barely there.
• Bridge jumping -- the fun part of economic development

Related

• Map of protected lands in the New River watershed
• What is wild and scenic?
• Economic pressures flow along state’s section of New River
• State park along New River offers little protection from development
• Wild and Scenic definition depends on whom you ask

FAYETTEVILLE, W.Va. -- Tom Wagner used to help people raft through the New River Gorge. Now he's helping them live beside it. The former river guide is development director and head cheerleader for Roaring River, a 4,300-acre gated community being built along the New River Gorge National River.

It's the largest residential development on the river, but it's only one of the three developments planned or ongoing along the New River Gorge National River. When they're done, there will be 2,500 new houses on the park's edge.

Opinions about that differ.

Calvin Hite, superintendent of the national river when Roaring River's proposal came before the local government, pleaded with Fayette County officials, imploring them to follow the county's comprehensive plan and keep developers away from the park.

"Real or perceived loopholes in the local political process are a poor excuse for not protecting this nationally significant resource for our children and grandchildren," Hite told the county's zoning appeals board last year.

Gene Kistler, a Roanoke Valley native, is a member of both the Fayette County Planning Commission and an environmental group called the Plateau Action Network. He owns Water Stone Outdoors, a downtown Fayetteville business that caters to adventure tourists.

"This place has never been screwed up by development," Kistler said. "It's been screwed up by timbering and mining, and that's healed up to an amazing degree. We have such an opportunity to do it right."

He's convinced that opportunity is being missed.

"There's a general attitude," Kistler said. "Don't say no to anything because we need whatever we get."

Don Striker, who replaced Hite as superintendent of the national river, sees the same tendency.

"It seems to me that anything that comes along with some short-term economic value, they're voting for it," Striker said.

To accommodate Roaring River, Fayette County commissioners voted to rezone thousands of acres from "land conservation," which was intended as a buffer for the national park, to "rural residential." That allowed the company to build one house for every two acres.

"Like so many communities, they don't seem to realize the power that they really have," Striker said. "The quick buck looks pretty good."

In 2006, Frommer's Budget Travel magazine named Fayetteville one of the coolest small towns in the United States. With a Wal-Mart just outside the historic downtown and an attitude that seems to choose a quick payoff over long-term gain, Striker said, Fayetteville is in danger of losing its funky hominess. If Fayetteville starts to look like Anyplace, U.S.A., he said, the town will lose a big part of what draws all those tourists who leave all that money behind.

And they are leaving money behind. According to a study commissioned by the park service, eco-tourism related to the New River Gorge National River -- rafting, rock climbing and other outdoor activities -- generates more than $130 million in annual spending across four counties. It is responsible for $9.3 million in taxes, $49 million in income and 3,550 jobs.

Kenneth Eskew, president of the Fayette County Commission, said his county needs more.

"Fayette County is not a real prosperous county," Eskew said.

The median household income in West Virginia is nearly $11,000 less than the national median of $44,334. Fayette County's is more than $5,000 below that -- about $8,000 below Virginia's Montgomery County.

Roaring River's Wagner said the development will bring 1,000 jobs to Fayette County over a decade.

"Your professional people down to yard maintenance people," Wagner said. "Across the board, there's opportunity for employment."

Roaring River also plans to spend $1.2 million to upgrade and extend the local water system. The company plans to improve the wastewater treatment system, too.

"One of the things that Land Resources takes pride in is developing areas that have unique environmental qualities so that we can preserve them and work together with resource managers in the area," Wagner said. "Responsible development that leaves a small footprint -- we've never varied from that."

Building lots are clustered together. Amenities -- trails, a clubhouse, a pool, picnic shelters -- will be spread around the development. Plans show that more than half of the development will be reserved for green space. Large trees are supposed to be marked for protection wherever possible.

The development, Wagner said, will have a 100-foot buffer along the park's boundary. Lots that touch that boundary will have an additional 50-foot buffer plus a 25-foot, no-cut zone. The county allows houses to be 40 feet tall. Roaring River will limit them to 35 feet. And the company won't put houses on more than 500 acres it owns inside the park's boundary, Wagner added.

Eskew described Roaring River as a role model for how to do things right.

Striker likes Roaring River's plans, too.

"There's a lot of bad development out there," he said. "I don't think we should pick on the ones who are trying to do it right."

Land Resources has 21 high-end, second-home developments across the Southeast. That market is shopped primarily by fiftysomethings with disposable income who want a vacation home near where they go to play. Wagner says Roaring River, the company's largest development so far, skews a little younger. Lot prices begin in the "high 50s," Wagner said. A 0.37-acre lot with a view into the national park and across to Babcock State Park is advertised on the Internet for nearly $190,000.

Wagner's customers, Striker said, may become some of the park's best allies. They're typical of the people who start "Friends of the Park" organizations.

Striker said he thinks it's unrealistic to think development won't come to the edges of the park, so the best thing to do is to have well-planned development that considers the park's needs.

All three developers working around the gorge are "pretty green," Striker said. And each has local people in lead roles, which he considers a good thing.

"They're genuinely good people who genuinely care about the community," Striker said.

But the proof, as the saying goes, is in the pudding.

"You have to more or less trust developers to do what they say they'll do," Striker said.

Kistler, the environmentalist and business owner, isn't so sanguine.

"It's great to live in a place where people want to move to," Kistler said. "It's a special place. It's worth fighting for."

And Kistler worries the New River is losing the fight.