THOUGHTFUL LETTER IN TODAYS I&M BY BAXTER ROAD PROPERTY OWNER Consider the options to hard-armoring Sconset Bluff To the Editor: The Board of Selectmen and the Sconset Beach Preservation Fund have together proposed two hard-armoring construction projects on the Sconset beach. Both projects are now before the Nantucket Conservation Commission. The first is a rock revetment and the second a set of geosynthetic textile tubes. While they differ in construction techniques and materials, they are similar in effect. How should we as citizens evaluate their impacts? Worldwide, residents of coastal communities are facing the impact of our changing climate: violent storms are becoming more frequent, and sea levels are rising. Nantucketers have seen both of these impacts. When beach erosion threatens homes, sewer beds, airport runways, roads, and utility lines, our first response is usually to think of ways to hold back the tide. When there are better alternatives available, hard-armoring construction projects on our beaches should be avoided for three reasons: first, hard-armoring always results in the loss of the beach. When ocean wave energy is not absorbed by the coastal bank, it takes the beach until there is no more beach to take. On Nantucket, our beaches have always been the source of our livelihood, from fishing to tourism. To sacrifice our beaches would be short-sighted indeed. Second, hard-armoring a section of coastal bank causes more severe erosion up and down the beach because of the differential impact of wave energy on armored and unarmored beaches. If a portion of the Sconset bank is armored, then more severe erosion will occur along Quidnet, Squam, Codfish Park, and Low Beach Road. Sacrificing some neighborhoods to protect others produces conflicts that fragment our community, replacing One Island with feuding enclaves. Third, the high cost of maintaining hard-armoring construction projects makes them self-defeating. Communities that have tried hard-armoring coastal banks — Scituate on the South Shore of Massachusetts provides a textbook case — have learned that the annual maintenance cost of a hard-armored structure quickly exceeds the original cost of construction. Even if the original structure is paid for by a private group or the Army Corps of Engineers, the annual costs borne by the Town could result in large tax increases. Moreover, when the Town supports hard-armoring for one neighborhood, it will be impossible to resist the pressure to undertake similar efforts for other neighborhoods threatened by erosion. Are there alternative approaches worthy of study? One option is to continue the use of so-called “soft armoring” techniques that have already been approved by the Conservation Commission. These have been effective and have relatively low maintenance costs. Another possible approach would be for the Town to arrange land swaps for coastal properties on which houses face the imminent threat of erosion loss. With knowledge of the ocean’s fury reinforced by their experience as whalers, earlier generations of Nantucketers were wary of building too close to our beaches. Looking forward, we might be better served by placing coastal properties in the hands of our many fine land conservation organizations. How would this work? The Town would take properties where homes and/or infrastructure were threatened by erosion. The Town would then arrange with conservation organizations to exchange endangered lots for land away from the ocean. Homeowners would then have to move their homes from the endangered lots to safe locations.This would also relieve the Town of having to maintain or replace threatened roads and utilities. The cost of this approach would be limited to the expenses involved in taking and exchanging land between homeowners and conservation organizations, in addition to some costs for relocating roads and utility lines for remaining homeowners. Homeowners along Baxter Road have for many years been moving their houses away from the bank, across the street, and to other island neighborhoods. As a Baxter Road homeowner, I realized when buying property ten years ago that the house would need to be moved. Now the house is one hundred feet back from the top of the bluff, thanks to the good work of island contractors who are experts in moving houses. Earlier generations of Baxter Road purchasers were told to buy land across the street for each lot they owned on the ocean side of Baxter. Nantucketers thinking about erosion impacts today deserve a full analysis of the probable tax, neighborhood and environmental costs of building revetments, sea walls, geoysnthetic tubes, and other hardarmored structures. If these are the best solutions available to us, the facts will demonstrate that. John Merson 71 Baxter Road
Posted on: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 10:26:51 +0000
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