For several years, Surfrider Foundation has been following closely the dramatic erosion events on Washington's open ocean coast and adjacent bay shorelines. The Department of Ecology's Southwest Washington Coastal Erosion Study identified expected future erosion along the Washington coastline. Situations like the breach of the South Grays Harbor Jetty in Westport the erosion of the beach near the North Grays Harbor Jetty in Ocean Shores and the massive erosion at the mouth of Willapa Bay have brought many concerns to property owners, coastal municipalities and thousands of Washington State citizens who enjoy and depend upon Washington's natural sandy beaches.
The Surfrider Foundation is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit environmental organization dedicated to the protection and enhancement of the world's oceans, waves, beaches and coastal habitats through conservation, activism, research and education. The Surfrider Foundation is the waterman's organization. We are surfers, fishermen, divers, and beachgoers people who spend a significant amount of time on the coast and in the ocean. Surfrider Foundation recognizes that protecting coastal and marine areas benefits not only diverse fish and wildlife populations, but also the people who enjoy and depend upon them.
Beaches are often perceived as separate habitats, but in reality are small parts of much larger coastal ecosystems. These systems include watersheds, estuaries and wetlands, and nearshore marine environments. They are dynamic in nature, change on multiple temporal and spatial scales, and are therefore difficult to predict with certainty. The Surfrider Foundation advocates conservation actions to promote long-term beach preservation for the benefit of the public.
Washington's beaches are unique coastal environments with enormous ecological, recreational and economic value. Our beaches are a public resource and should be held in the public trust. As human activities and development in coastal areas increase, the need for preservation of beaches becomes increasingly apparent.
In 1998, the Surfrider Foundation took legal action against the Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) when the agency introduced a plan to place a rock wall along the entire beach of Half Moon Bay in Westport, Washington. Surfrider Foundation recognized that this misguided plan to armor Half Moon Bay would have destroyed the entire beach in the Bay, eliminating beach walking and surfing which in recent years has become a source of critical income to the tourist economy of Westport.
The suit had been brought before the Pollution Control Hearings Board by the Surfrider Foundation to challenge Ecology's failure to extract a long-term commitment to beach nourishment from the Corps. Regular beach nourishment is critical to assure that erosion does not degrade the beach and expose the rock revetment, thereby destroying surfing and other recreational uses in Half Moon Bay as well as the revetment itself, requiring expensive and ineffective re-armoring of the shoreline at a future time.
In the summer of 1999, a settlement was reached between the Surfrider Foundation and the Corps relating to the revetment extension in Half Moon Bay. Perhaps the biggest victory for Surfrider Foundation, beach-goers and the citizens of Washington State is that the Corps abandoned its plan to place a rock wall along the entire beach of Half Moon Bay.
Additionally, the settlement required the Corps to strengthen its commitment to beach nourishment in Half Moon Bay, making it more likely that surfers and other beachcombers could continue to enjoy the Bay into the future. The settlement made long-term beach nourishment a component of the Corps' commitment to preserve natural sandy beaches.
However, the Corps has not met its obligation to maintain the beach. Recent events in Half Moon Bay have significantly eroded the beach and have dramatically impacted recreational and environmental resources in the area. Additionally, the wave refraction mound built at the end of the South Jetty at Half Moon Bay designed by the Corps Waterway Experiment Station and Pacific International Engineering seems to be dramatically increasing the erosion immediately adjacent to its construction, making the likelihood of a breach in the South Jetty as we saw in 1996 imminent. The wave refraction mound has failed to meet its intended purposes to "refract" wave energy away from the beach.
This raises serious concerns and further argues the need for additional environmental review of the proposal to develop "The Links at Half Moon Bay" 18-hole golf course, 400-room resort hotel, convention center and 400 condominiums directly on the coastal area in question. These are the sorts of coastal decisions that can place people and funds in harms way.
Basic coastal geology allows that any hard structure in the "impact zone" will cause the beach to erode faster. It is also basic knowledge to surfers because we know how and where waves break, and for the most part, what causes them. The wave refraction mound in Westport is negatively impacting the beach and surrounding resources because it is a hard structure on a sandy beach and therefore increases the erosion rate in front of and adjacent to its placement. It causes the wave energy to impinge directly on the beach, eroding and steepening the beach.
Those of us who spend a significant amount of time on the beach and in the ocean at Westport are familiar with these naturally occurring coastal processes. In the summer, smaller waves move sand on-shore to build up a wide beach. In the winter, big winter storms wash away beach sand; narrowing and the beach, sometimes forming large offshore sand bars that make waves break (with good outside swell) further from the coastline. Weeks, or sometimes months, later the seasonal waves and currents move the sand bars towards the shore, bringing some of the sand back to the beach (allowing many beachcombers, kite enthusiasts, families and dogs gather to frolic on the open ocean beach). However, the difference in Half Moon Bay is that the natural drift of sand has been blocked by the hard structure so that the natural accretion does not take place.
Historically, the jetties at the mouth of Grays Harbor have impounded sand that was supplied from shallow tidal inlet shoals around the inlet, particularly on the north side of Grays Harbor at Ocean Shores. The jetties removed the influence of ebb-tidal currents on the shoals and as a result sand from the shoals was more easily transported onshore by waves. The natural balance between the offshore-directed tidal currents and onshore-directed wave flows that formed the shoals around the inlet was significantly altered, resulting in redistribution of the sand. This is an ongoing process still occurring today, nearly a century after the jetties were constructed.
Today, the inlet between the jetties continues to scour. - If the proposed jetty extension/spur to protect the Ocean Shores condominiums is constructed it will reduce the sand supply to the inlet, and further increase erosion within the entrance and in Half Moon Bay.
This process will continue until no beach exists, only hard structures. We have seen this phenomenon on the East Coast, the Gulf Coast and the California Coast for over 100+ years and more recently here in Washington State throughout the Puget Sound and in Ocean Shores and Willipa Bay (where a rock jetty at its mouth seems to have increased beach erosion on both sides of its placement, including the increased erosion of the sand islands that protect the Shoalwater Bay Tribal land and its shellfish resources). Yet, we continue to ignore those lessons and implement the same mistakes that have destroyed ocean beaches and coastal resources elsewhere.
Surfrider Foundation is concerned that the recent policy decisions regarding the management of Washington's open ocean beaches including those impacting Half Moon Bay have put the future of our beautiful coastline at risk. The Surfrider Foundation is working for the continued preservation of Half Moon Bay and the rest of our Washington Coast.
It is time that Governor Locke, the Department of Ecology and the Army Corps of Engineers took a proactive role, working for the preservation of Westport's beaches and the rest of Washington's ocean coast. For too long our elected officials and state agencies have been able ignore the open ocean coast. Washington's open ocean coast is an ecological treasure of statewide significance. It is a resource whose condition reflects the quality of life in the Pacific Northwest. The region's future vitality is intertwined with the health of its environment and economy. Two years ago, in a press release from the Department of Ecology, Governor Locke was quoted as saying, "Many of our past shoreline management practices are harming private property, threatening the safety of our citizens, and destroying the quality of our shorelines." Isn't it time we do something about it?
We believe Washington's current coastal management policies are threatening the preservation of our open ocean beaches. We cannot tolerate the loss of our pristine coastline. Preserving Washington's natural sandy beaches is about protecting our coast and nearshore waters - places where we, as watermen surfers, divers, fishermen, and beachgoers go to enjoy the marine environment. We need to think of the next generation of beach users and our delicate coastal ecosystem when looking at Washington States coastal management.
If you are concerned about the conservation of our natural sandy beaches, take a moment and write to the Governor and tell him that the natural sandy beaches of Westport and the rest of the state need to be protected and preserved.
Source:
Surfrider Foundation,
Half Moon Bay editorial,
November 22, 2001
- Kevin Ranker
>kranker@surfrider.org
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