Notes From an Environmentalist; A National Strategy for Beach Preservation.

      A National Strategy for Beach Preservation      

In 1985, Orrin Pilkey, invited a group of coastal geologists to Georgia to prepare a national strategy for beach preservation in the face of sea level rise.  

They drew up what became known as the Skidaway Statement.

The Skidaway Statement, called for our nation’s barrier beaches to be gradually incorporated into the string of state and national parks, and wildlife refuges that already fringe our coasts.

They warned the alternative, would be for the country to armor its coasts at prohibitive expense, or retreat through a series of unpredictable disasters.

We have now become accustomed to seeing such disasters.

We have watched major coastal cities like Boston, New York, Miami and New Orleans, inundated by rising seas, and devastated by hurricanes and Nor’easters.

Just this past winter we saw hundreds if not thousands of seaside homes toppling into the sea in places like Cape Cod, Cape Hatteras, Fire Island, Padre Island, San Diego and Santa Monica.

The problem will only get worse.

NOAA, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, just released a study that shows that so-called king tides are on a thirty-year cycle dependent on the proximity of the earth, moon and the shape of their elliptical orbits.

That cycle will peak in the mid-2030’s when they expect 300,000 houses will experience regular flooding primarily due to higher tides in the north and sea level rise in the south.

During these tides, the oceans will advance 200 to 300 feet further onto shore where most of these shorefront houses are located.

In cities, governments and developers will have to pay billions of dollars if they want to protect investments worth trillions of dollars.  

In smaller communities coastal homeowners will have to foot the bill for expensive anti-erosion strategies, which will ultimately fail.

If our nation had followed through on the Skidaway recommendations we would have had a soft landing instead of our present series of unpredictable disasters.

 But the Skidaway Statement landed on Ronald Reagan’s desk with a resounding thud and was never heard from again. Since its demise, states, towns and the federal government have simply muddled through.

What we need now is for the nation to decide whether it wants to remain on its present trajectory towards an inevitable collapse or devise a national policy to foster a gradual withdrawal from the further development of barrier beaches.

The community I live in dealt with the issue of coastal houses another way. When the non-profit environmental organization called the Trustees came into town they bought out several small houses and barns to create the wildly popular Crane Beach.

The Federal government did the same thing when it created the Parker River Wildlife Refuge.

Both organizations have created much-used popular beaches that bring in substantial income to their local communities, as well as income to manage the beaches and properties they own.

Perhaps now it is time to resurrect the Skidaway Statement and adopt a similar national policy to fit our present era of more storms, higher tides, climate change, and runaway sea level rise.

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