The Brookview site is an early 1950's courtyard
barracks style rental apartment community that
has fallen into some disrepair and is laid out in
a form that is inconsistent with the traditional
development pattern of Claymont.
New Castle County published a comprehensive
plan in 2002 which outlined their intention
to protect unique historic neighborhoods and
natural resources by guiding development to be
consistent with their 300 year building heritage.
The product of community and government
efforts resulted in the Hometown Overlay Zone,
Design Guidelines, and Claymont Community
Redevelopment Plan.
From the Comprehensive Plan came the countywide
Hometown Overlay Zoning District. The
purpose of the overlay district is to streamline
the development process to promote villagestyle
development. It facilitates development
to have a mixed-use compact character and
provides flexibility in development standards
that supersede current zoning categories.
Without the historic overlay designation, this
preferred style of development would be difficult,
if not impossible, to implement.
Select communities in New Castle County
conducted their own Community Redevelopment
Plan to identify areas for development.
Claymont contracted Thomas Comitta Associates,
Inc. -Town Planners & Landscape Architects
to assist in this visioning process. From
this process came Claymont’s vision of growth
1) a revitalized Claymont town center and 2)
a re-established Philadelphia Pike as a main
commercial corridor. Building on the public
participatory planning process undertaken by
New Castle County and the town of Claymont,
The Commonwealth Group and Setting
Properties (Developers) and Torti Gallas and
Partners (Architects & Planners) undertook
a highly successful public charrette process to
develop a master plan for the redevelopment
of Brookview. The culmination of this intense
week long public process is the Master Plan