Incyte needs various government approvals to expand its campus along Augustine Cut-Off, just north of Wilmington. (Julie Zorach photo)
Neighbors opposing expansion by Incyte have raised the typical concerns about nearby development – increased traffic and decreased property values – if the biopharmaceutical company gets approval to expand its Alapocas campus.
Uniting as Neighbors for Responsible Land Use, they’re also concerned about the noise and dirt during construction, the trees that would die, the wildlife habitat that would be reduced and the way the complex is lit up at night.
They’ve complained that Incyte did not conduct community outreach and alleged that Incyte’s renderings are “inaccurate and misleading,” its traffic counts are invalid and its math keeps changing.
And they fret over what would happen to the site if Incyte is sold and leaves.
The group recommends that Incyte instead expand to existing vacant office space elsewhere, which would “invigorate those communities, while sparing green space and creating no hardship for Incyte.”
Two variances needed for the project hit the New Castle County Zoning Board of Adjustment on May 18. Group members packed an April meeting, and the group is encouraging another crowd.
Incyte is requesting variances to build a 400,000-square-foot building (bigger than what the land is now zoned for) and build fewer parking spaces (1,947) than what would be required (3,295). The company has said it expects to bring in 1,050 employees from other locations to the Alapocas campus on Augustine Cut-Off, just north of Wilmington.
New Castle County supports the variances, spokesman Brian Cunningham said, and the majority of the public’s testimony in April was against them.
Incyte also needs rezoning that will go to the county Planning Board for an advisory review and County Council for a vote. That process will run into autumn.
“The earliest the Incyte application could be scheduled for a Planning Board public hearing would be July 5th,” he wrote. “Because this is a rezoning, the public record will remain open for 30 days; therefore, the Planning Board would make their recommendation on the rezoning at their August 15th business meeting, which would put them before County Council in September.”
“This photo shows the newest building, 1709 or “The Tower” building through the trees,” neighbor Julie Zorach wrote. “Incyte claims to have installed blinds to protect light from flooding the environment. This is at 7:30 at night, and while the photo isn’t good, it does communicate a lot. There will be a retaining wall installed beyond these trees, and the new building will snake along this ridge … the trees will die because their roots will be amputated for the construction of the wall.” (Julie Zorach photo)
What bothers neighbors about Incyte
The expansion “is too big, too invasive, and would severely impact quality of life in nearby communities with excessive traffic, light pollution, and loss of green space,” Neighbors for Responsible Land Use said in a statement forwarded to DelawareLive.com after the April meeting.
Incyte’s plans are complicated.
A county page on the Board of Adjustment review has collected more than 250 pages of documents related to the project, which involves buying land from Wilmington Friends School. Another county page on the related subdivision development has more than 150 pages of documents.
“The current parcel is zoned Suburban,” the group wrote in an email to DelawareLive.com. “Incyte will seek to have it rezoned Office Regional.”
“Incyte wants to join the current parcel with the others that it owns,” which affects how much land it can build on. “The site calculations that Incyte has provided have been a moving target,” the email continued.
Incyte also wants a “zoning change that would permit light industrial uses on this parcel forever,” the group writes on its website. “Emissions are permitted by light industrial uses,” it warns.
Neighbors for Responsible Land Use, on its website, says it is also concerned about “additional light pollution (parking garage and building lights on all night), noise pollution (HVAC systems run all the time) and traffic.”
The Delaware Department of Transportation is planning traffic improvements on Augustine Cut-Off in front of Incyte and points south, across the bridge over the Brandywine, into Wilmington.
A petition drive reached out to residents of Alapocas, Alapocas II, Augustine Hills, Augustine Cutoff, Augustine Ridge, Brandywine Park Condominiums, the Highlands, the Pointe at Brandywine Park, Rock Manor and The Triangle.
“Born in California in 1991, Incyte initially focused on gene discovery,” Delaware Today reported in 2018. It moved to Delaware in 2002 and pivoted to biopharmaceuticals. In 2014, it moved to Alapocas, taking over a building that was once a John Wanamaker department store.
It has been remarkably successful since. Its median salary in 2021 was $248,810, Business Insider reported, citing number crunching by The Wall Street Journal, and placing it third among American tech companies, behind Alphabet (the parent of Google) and Meta (the parent of Facebook).
