Jungle Jim’s gets height variance for new water slide

Voting 3-2, the Sussex County Board of Adjustment approved a height variance to allow the owners of Jungle Jim’s Amusement Park to build a new 60-foot water slide, rising 18 feet above the county’s maximum height limit of 42 feet.

Jungle Jim’s – in operation since the mid-1970s and owned by members of the Lingo family – is located at the intersection of Country Club Road and Route 1, near the entrance to Rehoboth Beach.

The slide platform will rise 47 feet with a 13-foot canopy, about the same size as two existing water slides at the park. Those slides were built in 2002 and also exceed the county's height limit but were not subject to a public hearing before the board of adjustment. They were approved as part of a commercial site plan review by the county's planning and zoning commission.

Before a vote at the Feb. 29 meeting, board members debated the merits of allowing the slide to exceed height limitations.

Board member Bud Rickard said the applicant should stay within height limits and construct a 42-foot slide. “It’s not a need; it’s what they want,” he said. “They haven’t convinced me that this area can’t otherwise be developed. You can’t convince me a 42-foot slide would not operate just as well.”

Board member John Mills said the applicant’s attorney testified that the minimum height for the slide was 47 feet for safety reasons. “The park already has slides that high. I think it meets the standards,” he said.

The new slide will be built in an area where go-kart tracks used to be; the tracks have been removed over the past five years. It will be 80 feet from the park boundary line and about 120 feet from the closest residence.

Mills made the motion adding a requirement that the owners plant a tree buffer along the southeast and southwest sections of the park to shield neighboring communities.

Board members Mills, Brent Workman and Jeff Hudson voted in favor of the variance and board members Rickard and Chairman Dale Callaway voted against it.

Jungle Jim’s has been open since 1974 and was purchased in 1998 by the Lingo family from the Townsend family.

Bill Lingo, one of the owners, testified that the park’s five go-kart tracks have been removed to alleviate noise complaints from area residents. In addition, the park will have standard closing hours at 8 p.m.; the go-kart tracks stayed open until 10 p.m.

Additional parking will also be added to the existing parking lot because the overflow parking area across the road is being developed as the Rehoboth Gateway shopping center complex, expected to open this summer.