LOWCOUNTRY COMMUNITIES
Magnolia Plantation is one of many historic sites along the Ashley River.
LEROY BURNELL/THE POST AND COURIER
West of the Ashley It’s only 30 miles from the heart of the Charleston peninsula to the county line at the Edisto River, but in that short distance you’ll find everything from city streets to riverside fishing shacks and oceanfront golf courses.
David Slade covers business and writes a personal finance column for The Post and Courier. He’s a Pennsylvania native with family roots that extend throughout South Carolina. He moved to the area in 2004 after several decades of regular visits.
118 mycharlestononline.com
West of the Ashley River, suburbs extend in every direction in a mix of long-established neighborhoods and modern subdivisions, commercial crossroads and strip malls. Beyond the bedroom communities are barrier islands, historic plantations, working farms and small towns. It was west of the Ashley where settlers first landed in 1670, at what is now Charles Towne Landing, a 664-acre state-owned historic site. Charles Towne Landing is also home to the closest thing the Charleston area has to a zoo, the 22-acre “animal forest.” The Ashley traces its headwaters to Dorchester County near Summerville, and Ashley River Road (S.C. Highway 61) follows the river’s path, past apartment complexes and subdivisions to the historic, grand plantations that once sent products
down the river with the tides. Beyond the plantation district extends a broad patchwork of farm,swampandforest.Ruralandcricket-quiettoday,thearea is subject to extensive development plans. U.S. Highway 17 (Savannah Highway) is the main road through West Ashley to points south. Beyond the strip malls and car dealerships and past the city limits are the country towns of Ravenel, Hollywood and Meggett, and communities including Yonge’s Island and Adams Run. Charleston County’s Caw Caw Interpretive Center on U.S. 17 near Ravenel offers a glimpse of the area’s past, with former plantation rice fields carved from Cypress swamp, and wild-growing tea from a 20th- century tea farm. Closer to the city, James Island is home to Charleston’s well-