THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, January 29, 1995 TAG: 9501290046
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY MASON PETERS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ELIZABETH CITY LENGTH: Medium: 69 lines
Multimillion-dollar plans to develop waterfront tourist attractions in several Albemarle communities gathered momentum last week when a group of North Carolina bankers met privately to discuss a ``loan pool'' to help finance the projects.
Essential to the success of the proposed waterfront renovations, the planners said, is establishing a high-speed water transportation system that would link most of the communities by fast tourist ferries operating on Albemarle sounds and rivers.
Lending a flair to the proposals was the involvement of the president of Rouse Enterprises - a successful developer of waterfronts - in the Harbor Town program being promoted by the Tourist Division of the N.E. North Carolina Economic Development Commission in Elizabeth City.
The Tourist Division received a $200,000 grant for Harbor Town from the parent economic development group earlier this month at a meeting in Manteo.
``The grant will allow us to hire the Rouse Company - they're the best - to begin drawing up working plans for improving the waterfronts,'' said Bunny Sanders, director of the Tourist Division.
Riverside and soundside communities that will be studied by Rouse include Elizabeth City, Hertford, Edenton, Columbia, Plymouth, Swan Quarter, Engelhart, Belhaven, New Bern and Manteo, Sanders said.
``Each community has different attractions centered around the waterfront,'' said Sanders, ``The ultimate designs of Rouse Enterprises will enhance these advantages.''
James Rouse, the 80-year old community planner who founded the original Rouse Company in Columbia, Md., is internationally noted for his spectacular Baltimore inner harbor development and, most recently, a waterfront plan for Honolulu. He also participated in planning Norfolk's downtown waterfront.
Other announcements last week included:
Robert Barron, president and chief operating officer of Rouse Enterprises, will inspect the Albemarle communities targeted for waterfront improvement on Feb. 9. He will be accompanied by officials of the Tourist Division and the N.E. North Carolina Economic Development Commission.
Richard Futrell, a Rocky Mount bank executive who is a former budget director for Gov. James B. Hunt Jr., said he will continue to work with major North Carolina banking institutions to help develop financing for the Harbor Town concept. Futrell is chairman of Centura's executive committee.
Futrell, a native of Hertford, called a meeting of top bankers last Tuesday at Albemarle Plantation in Perquimans County to discuss the waterfront programs. He asked E. Royden Clark Jr., president of East Carolina Banks, to serve as chairman of a bank consortium that is being created for public-private financing of Harbor Town projects.
Other bankers who attended include representatives of BB&T, First Citizens, First Union, Hertford Savings, Seaboard and Wachovia Banks.
William Rich, a developer who heads the Rich Co. in Elizabeth City, said he was forming a Harbor Town Investment Group with the aim of raising $15 million in private funds to help in the waterfront-revitalization programs.
He said that half of the stock in the financing group would be held by large capital venture groups and the remainder would be offered to small private investors.
Rich emphasized the success of the Harbor Town program depended critically on high-speed water transportation that would move tourists between the waterfront communities. ``It won't work without the boats,'' Rich said.
Sanders said Friday she expected at least one fast ferry would be experimentally operating in Harbor Town waters ``this year.'' by CNB