By Levi Pulkkinen, The Aberdeen Daily World Writer, Thursday, July 10, 2003
WESTPORT - In an attempt to revive an erosion - control plan originally scaled back due to environmental concerns, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has announced its intention to place an additional 40,000 tons of gravel and stone cobble on the western shore of Half Moon Bay near the South Jetty.
Cobble is defined as stones up to 12 inches in diameter. In this case at least 50 percent will be less than three inches in diameter.
If installed, Corps engineers hope the rock will protect the often - breached neck of land connecting the South Jetty to Westhaven State Park, Project Manager Hiram Arden told The Daily World. The Corps cobbled a smaller section of beach in 2000 hoping to create a transition area, but Arden said he believes more rock is necessary to protect the breach site.
"With the storm season that we have starting in October, we felt this would be a good time to place this material and give us the kind of protection that will avoid another breach," Arden said.
Arden said that, instead of absorbing the eroding wave energy, the smaller transition area essentially forced the energy further down the beach. The new proposal, currently open to public comment, calls for the placement of rock on a 1,000 - foot - long section of beach between the South Jetty to the Coast Guard observation tower overlooking the bay in the hope that a larger transition area will eliminate the erosion threat.
The proposed project, expected to cost between $400,000 to $600,000, was first offered in 1999 as part of a difraction mound project. The mound - essentially a pile of dredged material dumped off the western lip of Half Moon Bay - was supposed to set the currents entering the bay on less destructive paths.
When the Corps asked for public comment for that proposal, interest groups and state agencies opposed the action, asserting that the cobble would cause environmental harm to the beach and limit the recreational opportunities in the area.
"To begin with, initially some of the resource agencies were hopeful that we could minimize the amount of this transition material," Arden said. "We placed some transition gravel material on the site there in January 2000. That was just a fraction of what had been recommended." In a compromise, the Corps only rocked the extreme west edge of the bay and loaded the rest of the breach - prone area with dredged material. As recently as March 17, Corps officials asserted environmental concerns would prevent them from dumping any more rock in Half Moon Bay.
According to its request for public comment, the Corps now believes erosion at the breach site can be temporarily slowed by using the amount of rock originally suggested by coastal - engineering firm Pacific International Engineering when it presented the refraction mound scheme.
"Since (2000), monitoring has shown that the transition material was not functioning as expected due to the reduced footprint and quantity of material placed," according to the June 27 announcement. "Performance of the transition materials was compromised by the placement of less material than the original design called for." Arden said he believes another installment of cobble will not move the erosion further down the beach, as the original batch seemed to. It is an opinion that Friends of Grays Harbor founding member Arthur "R.D." Grunbaum does not share.
"From a personal standpoint ... I think that if they put the rock there, it won't really dissipate the energy," Grunbaum said. "If you put the rock there, it's going to start eroding near the Coast Guard tower." Grunbaum said the wave difraction mound the cobbled area was meant to complement has not performed as the engineers predicted.
Performance questioned
As reported in The Daily World earlier this year, the difraction mound's performance was questioned by a number of the state's coastal - erosion experts at an inter - agency meeting put on by the Corps. There, Department of Ecology scientist George Kaminsky told Corps officials and the representatives of the mound's installer, Pacific Engineering International, that the mound has focused erosion on the site of the 1993 breach.
"One thing we should be looking at is the effect of the mound on the erosion in Half Moon Bay," Kaminsky said March 17. "Because of the mound, we have a higher erosion level at a critical spot. We've maintained a crisis." Arden said the Corps is currently studying the difraction mound's effect on the bay, and that changes to the mound may be necessary. He said the current proposal should not be construed as a final solution to the erosion issues in Half Moon Bay.
"I think it's called out as an interim solution to avoid any energy situation this fall," the engineer said. "We'll be evaluating it's performance and looking into a long - term solution." Grunbaum said he believes that the course set by the Corps will lead to "hard" solutions on Half Moon Bay which will, in turn, destroy the location's recreation appeal and value as a rearing ground for surf smelt. "I personally think this is a precursor to hardening Half Moon Bay," he said. "I think that it's not in the best interest of the public. The shorelines in the state of Washington are owned by the people of Washington, not just the people that are fortunate enough to live (near the beach)." The Corps will be accepting public comment on the project until July 28.
On the web: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers public notice is at http://www.nws.usace.army.mil/publicmenu/DOCUMENTS/PB21.pdf
This page created and maintained by Chehalis River Council
Send comments or questions to the: Chehalis River Council