A walk along Manalapan’s beachfront is a dramatic illustration of the adage, “a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.”
Towering steel seawalls riddled with huge, rusted, Swiss cheese-like holes lay bowed seaward before eroded pits where lawns, patios and pools once stood. Where one of these failed seawalls connects with another of newer construction, the strain of the connection is obvious: In some cases it forced the collapse of the neighboring wall.
In the aftermath of local wave damage and flooding generated by Hurricane Sandy, discussions of coastal armoring and beach renourishment have become topics for heated discussion among individual homeowners and community leaders.
These discussions are essential. When it comes to beaches, seawalls and bulkheads, we all have a lot to learn. There’s private vs. public, seawalls vs. dunes and the impact of rising sea levels on the beachfront and along the Intracoastal Waterway.
Why do we need to spend our sunny days in paradise studying these issues? Because they affect our safety, our property values and any hope we might have of passing along our barrier-island home to future generations.
Whatever is done in one town will impact the others. Until we all get together and find common ground with a barrier-island master plan for coastal preservation, we will be subject to the whims of nature.
The time is now, and we can’t afford to be cheap. Unless we are prepared to let our beaches, dunes and bulkheads go au naturel, it’s going to take money. We need to educate ourselves to make smart decisions, devise plans and guidelines and then intelligently execute on those plans.
Anyone who believes that you can live in paradise without paying for it is the weak link in our chain.
Mary Kate Leming, Editor
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