Planned Development Prompts Fears of Chesapeake Congestion

"There's no mandate for counties to plan regionally," Claggett said. What bay communities need, he said, is "a collective vision that everyone buys into, that has both growth and environmental protection aspects."

Maryland's "smart growth" laws were one attempt to do that. The laws attempt to direct development to areas where it is least harmful to the environment, in part by allowing state planners to scuttle development deemed unsuitable for the existing infrastructure.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation said that the Blackwater project is a test of the laws and that the state, by signing off on the project in the summer, has failed.

This is Maryland's chance to show how serious it is about helping farmers while helping local governments encourage environmentally sensitive growth, said foundation President William C. Baker. Instead, foundation officials said, the project as proposed would occupy more protected waterfront land than has any other in the state.

"We haven't seen a project of this size and scope in a long time," Baker said. If it's built, "It's going to be open season on the Eastern Shore."

Farming is no longer an option on this land, said William "Sandy" McAllister, the attorney for Duane Zentgraf, Blackwater Resort's developer. A dapper man who drives a black Jaguar, McAllister is a former city attorney and grandson of the former state's attorney. Like some others who have grown up here, he objects to come-lately "Birkenstock knuckleheads" dictating what's best for Cambridge.

"We've had three years of approvals from people who have been elected to give them," he said. "If the Chesapeake Bay Foundation had participated in nearly three years of design hearings and approvals, perhaps they would share our conviction that this is a well-designed project that will be terrific for Cambridge and which in no way will adversely affect the bay."

Two weeks ago, McAllister, Zentgraf, bay foundation officials and legislators sat down, for the first time, to talk. They shared points of view, hinted at lawsuits and then spoke about compromise. But what a compromise might be, nobody could say.

"It might be one of those things you can make less worse -- maybe not perfect or not very good," said bay foundation director Kim Coble, who attended the meeting. "But with 100,000 people moving in every year, I feel as if we have to do something ."