Seawalls

[Amp22]

pmd8 - most of the gf owners are using approved fill. There are a few glaring instances of ugly fill and I don't know how they are getting away with it.

BMBV - I take it (pun intended) that anytime you replace natural habitat with artificial habitat or modified habitat it is considered "take".

I believe that the knee jerk reactions were by county officials and gf homeowners to do wahtever they could as fast as they could whether they really knew what they were doing or not and whether knowing it would really help or not. It was panic and it was let's do whatever we want and ask forgiveness later. Acting in panic mode never brings good results. The argument about property rights, building on dunes, etc. shouldn't be a practical part of the argument at this point and has been covered pretty good on this board months ago.

Rather - is the right thing being done recently and now? If you walk along the beaches and see the travesty going on the answer is easily no. There was little planning and little oversight. Some seawalls may be done "right" but most are a mess. If they can be covered VERY well and deep and planted then they will look fine and not be dangerous.

UNTIL they are destroyed some day in the future by a storm. And they WILL be destroyed. At that time we wll be neck deep on our beaches by the biggest mess of debris you've ever imagined. I don't want to see that or pay for removal which will never get completely done anyway as much of it will be half or completely buried.

Take or leave my opinion, but it is the height of arrogance for gf owners to think they are "improving" or "repairing" the beaches for the rest of us. We may not be paying for your seawalls but we will PAY for your mistakes for generations.

It would have made a lot more sense for all the gf owners and the county to put all the money and effort into a beach nourishment project for eastern Walton County.

 

[pmd8]

You ask why it matters if there's a wall behind the dune? http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2003/of03-337/construction.html
Coastal Construction - Role of Human Activities - An Overview of Coastal Land Loss: With Emphasis on the Southeastern United States

 

[Amp22]

BMBV. I'm afraid to ask where my posts would fall in your equation! However, I welcome your posts and have wanted to hear from a GF property owner since this all began. Can you tell us more about your situation? I am not understanding this process and the huge fees involved.

Several gf owners have posted on these issues and they have been slammed pretty hard.

 

[pmd8]

I mostly agree with you Amp22, although I've discussed beach renourishment in prior posts and have seen it first hand in Panama City Beach and Miami Beach.
The sand is not the same and it's a temporary and expensive solution.

Regards.

 

[pmd8]

In regard to "all the opposition is from those who don't have beachfront property", the beach is public, so we all own beachfront property.

I do have bayfront property in Panama City and Miami Beach. We've left the Panama City property in it's natural state, despite the fact that our neighbor's seawall has affected it. In Miami Beach, my property is on a "fill island" and seawalls have completely encircled the island since it was formed in the 1930's. I do not use fertilizer on my yard because it eventually finds its way into the bay.

Think globally, act locally.

 

[Beachlover2]

I was going to do a link to this previous discussion - but decided instead to just cut and paste - this was from Dave Raushkolb in October of last year and I think it is in better words than I could say






Coastal Erosion solutions: Seawalls, Geo-tubes, Beach Scraping and Beach Nourishment. What is the answer?

Basically, when the ocean rises due to a hurricane there are three powerful forces at work: wind, rising tide and ocean swells from a storm. The water that is moved by those forces moves in three directions. The tide brings the water up, the storm moves the wave action in and the wind pushes the water/waves in the direction of the wind.

Most of us who have experienced a hurricane know that when a storm approaches and we are on the east side of that storm we get winds from the northeast, then east, then southeast, then south and on around to the west and so on. The inverse would be true if we were on the west side of the storm. The key point is that for a large portion of the time the tide is abnormally high, the swells are abnormally big and the east or west current is scouring the beaches parallel to the beach.

The beach sand is a porous movable material that is completely vulnerable to these forces. Solid structures are also vulnerable to these forces but, more importantly the sand next to any solid structure will be scoured away much more rapidly than if there was no solid structure near it.

Let's dispense with scraping first. It makes the beach nicer to look at but that's it. It is newly pushed sand that has no level of impaction so it washes away in minutes. Placing sand back on the cliff/dunes and planting sea oats provides a favorable cosmetic solution.

Seawalls and geo-tubes are solid, heavy structures. Any porous sand next to these structures gets scoured away very rapidly making the situation worse near them. If you have a house next to a seawall, your backyard will go faster as the east riptide and oncoming waves collide with the seawall. The same is true with the beach in front of the seawall. The impact of the water hitting it and pushing sideways with the tide completely eliminates the beach in front of it. All you need to do is look at the wall in Galveston Texas; there used to be a beach there, now you just jump off the wall into the water; no beach. A geo tube is heavy and more solid than the sand. Any thing near these things will have sand scouring next to them too. Also when the water gets behind a seawall it washes away the sand behind it with the same impunity. Some of you might have seen the photo of the breached seawall on Dog Island I posted after Hurricane Dennis.

The largest seawall in the county is being installed just east of Seaside and it runs from the Wheel House/Seagrove villas and ends at the 30-A/395 intersection and could go further as adjacent homeowners buy on. It is roughly 20 feet high and runs 4 blocks long. Adjacent homeowners will be affected and the beach behind that wall will disappear if we get a few more storms to start the scouring activity. The prevailing winds here are from the east and the river of sand that runs along our beach could soon be interrupted and affected by this seawall.

The only solution to our erosion problem is to focus on getting our beaches nourished by pumping sand back on to the beaches. All of Walton County is being surveyed and the wheels are in motion. All these seawalls will do is destroy adjacent property and eliminate the beaches behind them. Geo-tubes will have a similar effect as the water washes over and around them.

Rosemary Beach has investigated thoroughly all options including geotubes and has decided to push for the sand dredging/beach nourishment option. There will be no geotubes or seawalls in Rosemary Beach. They did decide to do some cosmetic work (scraping) on the dunes/cliffs and finish with sea oat plantings. The town manager, James Bagby gave a very informed talk at the Rosemary Beach Homeowners meeting on where the county and federal agency's are in the beach nourishment process and it looks like it could happen countywide if approved. Jim said the pumping would take 3 days to do Rosemary Beach and would raise the beach 6 to 8 feet and go out 100 to 150 feet out.

The nourishment effort/process has taken its course in the west end of the county and they will soon begin pumping sand there. They are beginning the process for our part of the county from Inlet beach down and there will soon be a stage for public input. The whole beachfront of the county is being surveyed for this purpose and sand core samples are being taken in the gulf for sources of white sand. Funding will be an issue but if approved the beaches will be automatically nourished by the federal government after major storms. Panama City beach has been doing this for years already.

In Okaloosa County 5 beachfront homeowners disputed the nourishment project delaying it in lawsuits for 2 years. They were concerned that the thin strip of public access from the high tide waterline to the water would be enlarged if the beach was widened and people would set up beach chairs behind their property. I believe they are now being sued by adjacent owners who lost their homes in recent storms. When the time comes for public input our county voices must be united behind the nourishment answer. That?s the answer.

 

[Amp22]

In regard to "all the opposition is from those who don't have beachfront property", the beach is public, so we all own beachfront property.

I do have bayfront property in Panama City and Miami Beach. We've left the Panama City property in it's natural state, despite the fact that our neighbor's seawall has affected it. In Miami Beach, my property is on a "fill island" and seawalls have completely encircled the island since it was formed in the 1930's. I do not use fertilizer on my yard because it eventually finds its way into the bay.

Think globally, act locally.

I agree that nourishment (they don't call it renourishment) is not ideal but the mistake of building too close to the water was made long ago. Dredge and fill makes sense if enough time goes by before having to do it again.

You must be on the Venetian Causeway?

 

[Smiling JOe]

If you have been lurking on this board for any length of time, you know my position on seawalls, and I shall not go further with that at this time.

BlueMtnBeachVagrant, I just want to say thank you for contributing to the discussion. Please don't be so quick to block out and supress even the simplest of thoughts regarding seawalls, or anything for that matter. When you disagree, simply state your case. That encourages communication and understanding. A person doesn't have to be knowledgeable on a particular topic to have a basic thought of such a thing. If your thoughts are more well-rounded, please, by all means, share them and help enlighten us who may not be as well-versed. To simply say, refrain from negative comments will never help to communicate and educate.

Again, thanks for being willing to get on stage. Now dance! ;-)

 

[kathydwells]

I don't have a gf home. Heck, I don't even own a home down there. But I do have a place that I love in Seagrove that most of you know about. They do have a seawall. I don't know all the pro's and con's of the issue. I have read enough to know that I am glad I don't have to make a decision on the matter. However, I found this picture and thought I would share it. I was just trying to educate myself, but I thought some of you might find it interesting as well.

 

[ecopal]

The purpose of a seawall is only to protect a private house with no concern to what it does to the beach.

Seawalls will just interfere with natural beach renourishing and contribute to erosion of the beaches and to neighboring beach front homes.

Some beach front owners who put in seawalls are having second thoughts now that they have found out that they have opened themselves up to litigation and penalties from federal and state environmental agencies not to mention their neighbors whose property could be damaged by the beach scouring caused by a seawall.

Many beach front owners who put in seawalls have also permanently damaged the beach by digging into the solid subsurface which will destabilize the beaches and make them more prone to erosion in the next storm.

Some beach front owners, fortunately a minority, also brought in dark sand to save money.

Kudos to owners who have showed good judgment by using quasi natural means such as bringing in high grade white sand, planting it with sea oats, and installing sand fencing.

We all need to call our County Commissioners to make sure the beach front owners who put in seawalls aren?t successful in their blitz of political pressure to make the county subsidize their seawall folly with tax money.

I was at the meeting Monday night where the county generously offered to act as facilitator for the seawall owners in their application process for permanent permits. Rather than thanking the county for their support some of them were complaining that the county was not going to pay for it and also protect them from litigation.