The sea is rising, and so is the angst for coastal homeowners

Earlier than Walt Dunlap moved in 2011 to the shores of Maquoit Bay, simply south of Brunswick, he did his homework. A licensed land surveyor, Dunlap knew the steep banks sloping right down to the ocean had been unstable and susceptible to erosion. The home stood simply 30 toes from the highest of the financial institution, and Dunlap, who left South Carolina to flee a rising sea, “simply needed to ensure that we had one thing that was not going to vanish in a single day.”

Dunlap surveyed the Freeport property himself, utilizing 1947 maps as a baseline. The highest of the financial institution hadn’t moved, and whereas he knew erosion on the backside was doable, the decrease financial institution was camouflaged by dense foliage and vegetation, making it troublesome to see simply how a lot the soils had been crumbling. The Dunlaps signed the papers, got here up seasonally for just a few years, then moved full time in 2015.

The extra time they spent, the clearer it grew to become: The underside of the financial institution was slipping into the ocean. The shallow bay, uncovered to the prevailing southwesterlies, was battered by more and more intense winds and storms; waves gouged out the financial institution from under, whereas heavier and heavier rainfall pushed the soil down from above. 

“We didn’t admire that there may be an issue.”

The cycle of shoreline erosion is a pure course of that has been occurring so long as there was land and sea: Bluffs and dunes crumble, feeding their soils and vitamins into the mudflats and marshes under. The shoreline shifts landward, stabilizes for some time, then wears away once more.

“Erosion results in stability results in erosion results in stability — the general pattern is that this characteristic transferring landward in response to sea degree rise,” mentioned Peter Slovinsky, a marine geologist with the Maine Geological Survey who has suggested communities on methods to cope with an encroaching ocean for greater than a decade.

The issue arises when people construct boundaries to that motion: houses, partitions, ice cream shacks, boardwalks, inns. Stable, immovable buildings, just like the seawalls and bulwarks scattered alongside the state’s bluffs and seashores, make the issue worse — waves hitting the wall mirror down and up, scouring out sand and soil on the base, and across the edges. In consequence, water in locations with partitions is far deeper, and “as a result of the water’s deeper, you may get a lot bigger waves there,” mentioned Slovinsky.

Partitions, which have to finish someplace, additionally speed up erosion round their edges. “As a result of that is now eroding, the property over right here says I would like a wall, then the subsequent one, then the subsequent one, then the subsequent one,” mentioned Slovinsky. “So it’s form of a perpetual drawback.”

Figures are arduous to return by, however those that work alongside the coast say they’re seeing increasingly more owners armoring their properties towards erosion with the whole lot from native crops and strategically positioned rocks to giant granite partitions and bulwarks.

When the Dunlaps seen in 2015 they had been shedding the underside of their financial institution, they instantly set about remedying the issue. The couple employed a landscaping firm with expertise in shoreline stabilization; the corporate ripped out the invasive vegetation that had grown up alongside the financial institution, and changed it with 100 native crops and an engineered, porous material to assist hold the soils in place. The Dunlaps personal about 50 toes of shoreline; the plantings and allowing value roughly $12,000, mentioned Dunlap — cash the couple was keen to spend so long as it helped hold the ocean within the bay and never their front room.

Walt Dunlap employed an organization to put in engineered material and native crops to try to cease erosion at his property in Freeport. The repair is “working nicely,” mentioned Dunlap, however requires some upkeep and isn’t stopping erosion on the backside of the bluff. Courtesy picture.

What the Dunlaps did — planting native crops — is exactly the form of repair the Maine Division of Environmental Safety wish to see coastal property house owners implement towards erosion. The plantings had been a part of a “residing shoreline,” a system designed to shore up the financial institution whereas permitting some soil to fall away, feeding the wetlands or flats under, whereas not exacerbating the issue in the best way partitions or bulwarks do. 

Besides, say engineers, residing shorelines typically don’t work — at the least in Maine, with its robust winds and highly effective tides.

“There’s not loads of locations that I see on the coast of Maine the place the softer approaches work,” mentioned Invoice Walsh, founding father of Walsh Engineering Associates, which designs options for owners to manage erosion up and down the coast.

“We’ve got an excessive amount of wave vitality and an excessive amount of motion on our shoreline,” Walsh continued. “I perceive the place the (Maine Division of Environmental Safety) is coming from, and that that’s the place most individuals need to be environmentally, however I haven’t seen one which’s labored.”

The thought behind residing shorelines is to imitate the pure setting, working with nature, not towards it. Specialists consult with shoreline stabilization methods as “inexperienced” or “tender” — principally crops and soils — or “grey,” the more durable buildings like partitions and stone. What works in a single spot could not work in one other — designs rely on an extended record of things, from the prevailing winds and form of the land beneath the ocean as to whether the soil is clay, dust or rock. 

Slovinsky factors to tasks farther south, in North Carolina and Maryland, the place “softer” approaches — piling logs on a seaside to lure sand, as an example — have been profitable for many years. Maine is making an attempt simply that at Popham Seaside, the place numerous dunes had been swept away throughout a December storm. It’s too quickly to inform how lasting will probably be, however the logs, which Slovinsky helped place, had been already trapping sand lower than every week later.

“There’s already some little ridges forming” from what was as soon as a flat seaside, mentioned Slovinsky. 

There are state parks in North Carolina, he mentioned, the place for many years outdated Christmas timber have been piled alongside the shore to lure sand – a design Maine is contemplating at Willard Seaside in South Portland, which additionally noticed intensive erosion this winter. “It’s very, very efficient in areas the place you get loads of wind-blown sand,” mentioned Slovinsky. 

Whereas there’s “all the time an opportunity one other storm goes to return this winter and wipe these all out,” mentioned Slovinsky, seawalls fabricated from concrete or stone could not fare significantly better. “Simply go right down to Wells after the December storm. There are blown-out seawalls in every single place.” 

The plantings on the Dunlaps’ property labored nicely in stabilizing the financial institution for just a few years. However the backside of the financial institution continued to erode and in 2019, the couple employed a contractor to design one thing extra substantial, with rocks on the backside, to assist stem the circulate of soil to the bay.

“The estimate was $35,000,” mentioned Dunlap, “and that’s just a few years outdated now.” The DEP additionally urged that the couple may have core samples taken to additional decide how the financial institution was eroding. “At that time we determined this isn’t going wherever,” mentioned Dunlap. “Not with the period of time, hassle and cash it’s going to value.”

Even when they fastened their portion of the financial institution, it was only a 50-foot stretch in 1,000 toes of unstable shoreline, Dunlap reasoned, which meant they’d must work with property house owners round them to give you a extra lasting repair. “We had been too intimidated by the method going ahead to do something extra substantial.”

The method could be difficult, particularly for property house owners trying to put one thing in the place earlier than there was nothing. Whereas those that have already got seawalls are allowed to rebuild them by way of a easy permit-by-rule course of, the state usually prohibits setting up new seawalls on sandy seashores, and discourages them on coastal bluffs, which make up 48% of Maine’s shoreline.

Slovinsky would really like the principles round bluffs to be tightened and extra express to additional encourage extra pure options, partly to save lots of the state’s tidal wetlands, that are liable to drowning as partitions are constructed that minimize off their provide of sediment. 

The state’s rules are geared towards defending the intertidal zone, mentioned Slovinsky. “What these requirements don’t take into consideration is that the marsh or mudflat wants erosion of that bluff to maintain itself. In case you minimize off the sediment provide, the useful resource we’re defending goes to go away anyway.” 

The state does have requirements that say owners can’t have an “unreasonable impression” on the availability of sediment to an adjoining wetland. 

“However what’s actually unreasonable?” Slovinsky requested. “Give it some thought in context of an eroding cove that’s received wetlands and mudflats in it. One home in that cove places a wall in — that’s probably not unreasonable. Two homes, three homes, 4 homes, 5 homes, six homes — subsequent factor you understand the entire cove is armored and the availability of sediment to that useful resource we’re making an attempt to guard is minimize off.”

A wall underneath building on a bluff in Bar Harbor. Photograph by Kate Cough.

The state can’t simply pull out figures for what number of permits have been issued for seawall restore or building through the years — they’re lumped in with permits for different actions within the shoreland zone, like changing a patio or a home, mentioned David Madore, a spokesman for the Division of Environmental Safety, in an e-mail. However engineers and others who work on the coast mentioned they’re seeing increasingly more owners armor their shorelines towards a rising ocean and more and more violent storms.

“The value level has gone up, however the means of the brand new owners to spend money on it has additionally gone up,” mentioned BJ Grindle, proprietor of Maine Coast Marine, who estimated he’s seen his name quantity double lately. 

Shoreline safety isn’t low cost: Grindle costs $8,000 for allowing alone, and estimates that it prices between $2,000 to $3,000 per lineal foot of shoreline, relying on the venture. Contractors work solely within the fall and winter, when the bottom is frozen, to reduce injury to the shore, and infrequently need to barge in supplies from the ocean if there’s no approach to get them over land. 

Initiatives can simply run into the tens and even a whole bunch of hundreds of {dollars}, significantly in the event that they’re on islands or out-of-the approach peninsulas. Wind and climate complicate an already troublesome job — Grindle, who has one barge, was caught in Bar Harbor for six weeks this winter as a result of the winds had been too excessive for him to go away. The job is “grueling on loads of ranges,” mentioned Grindle. “Lengthy hours, very distant, and really uncomfortable — it’s brutal, it’s chilly, it’s windy, it’s moist on a regular basis.”

Whereas many Maine coastal owners can bear the price of repeatedly tinkering with a design, others who inherited property and that’s “the one factor they’ve,” mentioned Walsh. So writing a verify for tens of hundreds of {dollars} for a repair which will solely final just a few years and would require upkeep is a tough promote.

“It’s actually arduous for me to say, ‘We’re going to design this for you and also you’re going to spend tens of hundreds of {dollars} on it, and I’m undecided if it’s going to final a 12 months,’” mentioned Walsh. 

“It’s a little bit of a predicament. We’ve created this example, and I notice individuals need it to be completely different. I perceive perhaps from the standpoint of (the Division) a sand dune and saying, ‘this needs to be pure.’” He paused. “We handed the pure level a very long time in the past.”

Walsh’s firm not too long ago designed a residing shoreline for a Freeport house owner to stabilize the slope in entrance of her home. He returned to the property final month and the system they designed — engineered materials and plantings, which value between $40,000 to $50,000 — was gone.

“She instructed me: ‘I would like an answer that isn’t going to clean away.’”

Kate Cough covers the setting for The Maine Monitor. Attain her by e-mail with story concepts: kate@themainemonitor.org.