Lakeside at Trappe is raising environmental impact concerns

TRAPPE, Md. – Lakeside has been in the works for 25 years, and experts say a development this large can bring up to five thousand people to the town with a current population of just above a thousand, and with that, potential wastewater pollution.

Talbot County residents, specifically in the town of Trappe, are expressing concerns over large housing developments and the environmental impacts they could have on the Eastern Shore.

Current Talbot County Council Vice President Pete Lesher tells us when they approved the sewer system for Lakeside they made a mistake that could impact local residents.

“The nature of the controversy of the previous county council’s decision has to do with the basis of that decision and the facts that were presented to that council in rendering that decision,” Lesher said. “The approval to extend the sewer into the newly annexed area where the lakeside is supposed to be built.”

Lesher went on to tell us that Talbot County Council is working to fix the issues.

“Resolution 281 did in fact have some mistakes in it, some mapping errors and Maryland Department of Environment has circled back to the county and asked us to correct errors.”

Steve Kline, President of the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, says Wastewater is the greatest concern brought up by local residents.

“I think the residents have concerns about what a 2,500 unit residential development with a huge commercial footprint will mean for Talbot county and the whole region of the Eastern Shore region,” Kline said. “The number one concern so far is water quality and what 2,500 units would mean for the Choptank River, for Trappe Creek and other waterways in the area.”

Limiting the amount of wastewater from the housing development of Lakeside and protecting the watershed are not the only concerns that the ESLC and local residents have about the “massive” housing development.

“The pressure on schools, the pressure on emergency services, the police department, the fire department, the pressure on roads and all kinds of infrastructure that I don’t think have been adequately accounted for.”

Kline says the increase of 5,000 people will also have a serious impact on traffic congestion on U.S. Route 50.

“At some point, this development is going to require a substantial improvement in the root 50 infrastructure and the entire corridor, so that will come at a great cost to the state tax payer.”

Kline also says that agriculture requires very little from Talbot County taxpayers by way of infrastructure, but the lakeside development could change that.

The 5,000 potential additional taxpayers could lose valuable resources with the development.

Kline says those costs include things like acres of land that could have otherwise been used for farming.

“Every acre we take out of production to do something else with it, is an acre we never get back,” Kline said. “Once these things are underneath a house or a commercial space, they are not coming back to agriculture and that has an impact on the ag-economy that’s as real as any impact you can imagine.”