Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 20, 1994 TAG: 9403210176
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-11 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By STEVE KARK CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: PEARISBURG LENGTH: Medium
Their plan proposes studying how development could occur along the New River and Walker Creek with minimal environmental impact.
It also recognizes that tourism plays a major role in the county's economy - 22 percent of the county's gross retail sales in 1988, more than any other county in Southwest Virginia, according to the Virginia Division of Tourism.
The county's popularity can be credited to a variety of county attractions: Mountain Lake, the Cascades, the Jefferson National Forest and the Appalachian Trail.
Although Giles's 35-mile stretch of river is longer than in any other Virginia county, the river's potential has remained largely untapped, according to the greenway plan.
In 1992, funded by a Virginia Environmental Endowment grant, the National Committee for the New River began to conduct small-scale conservation projects in several juristictions along the New River. However, the committee soon recognized the potential in Giles and decided to focus its efforts there.
Jean White, executive director of the national committee, says that the county is ``underutilizing its best resource ...''
``This is a way of developing the county's unique potential without raping, plundering or pillaging the landscape,'' says Greenway Project Director Randi Lemmon, formerly of the New River Valley Planning District Commission.
A key premise in the New River committee's original grant proposal is that development and conservation are not mutually exclusive. The group wanted to show that the best kind of development along the river is that which preserves the river's natural quality, which, in turn, increases opportunities for tourism and recreation.
Last July, the Virginia Environmental Endowment awarded the committee $32,500 to plan and develop a greenway project in Giles county.
The project has received letters of endorsement from a wide variety of groups.
The county supervisors have endorsed the grant application, but with reservations about any possible limitations on the private property rights of riverside landowners. Supervisors' Chairman Larry ``Jay'' Williams says that some folks who own property along the river, especially east of the Ripplemead bridge, are concerned that the project would restrict how they use their land.