Harbeson Post Office should be open by end of summer

After a brief stoppage, workers are back at the site of the new Harbeson Post Office.

United States Postal Service spokesman Ray Daiutolo said the post office at 18865 Harbeson Road should be open for business by the end of summer.

Construction was stopped when money ran out. Daiutolo said work has resumed now that additional funding has been appropriated.

A crew began working June 5 to place a modular building on the lot. Interior work and grounds, parking lot and road access work are now underway.

The existing post office at the intersection of Route 9 and Harbeson Road closed Dec. 29, 2018, to make way for construction of a Royal Farms convenience store. Since the post office closed, 200 post office box holders have had to travel to the Georgetown Post Office.

Before it closed, during a meeting with Harbeson residents, postal service officials said it would take about six months to a year to select a new location and get a post office. If it opens in early September, the project will have taken 1 year and eight months to complete.

In order to get the facility, the parcel had to be rezoned. On Oct. 22, 2019, Sussex County Council approved a rezoning application from MR, medium-density residential, and AR-1, agricultural-residential, to B-2 community business district, filed by Harbeson Farm Revex LLC for the .8-acre parcel, about one-half mile south of the Route 9 intersection.