The Wall Street Journal has an article up on its free RealEstateJournal site regarding an interesting little debate taking place on Topsail Island, North Carolina.
More than 40 years ago, M.A. Boryk and some friends bought about two dozen acres of land on the southern tip of Topsail Island, a long slip of sand off the North Carolina coast. As the decades passed, nature gave them a lot more.
Waves, wind and ocean currents — the forces that create and constantly resculpt such barrier islands — deposited sand at the point owned by the Boryk partners, adding to their plot. The buyers and their families became wealthy by selling and building homes on beachfront property. Now they are fighting to keep their right to develop another 125 acres of land that rose out of the sea.[...]
Much of the sinking northern tip of Topsail is habitable today only because state and local governments spent millions of tax dollars to reconstruct roads and infrastructure there after hurricanes Fran and Floyd. Fishermen avoid the area because formerly waterfront houses now are submerged in the New River Inlet. Their roofs and porches snag fishing lines and nets.
When Hurricane Ophelia grazed the eastern seaboard of the U.S. in September, it cut deep rivulets in the north end of Topsail and left condemned buildings perched over the surf. The storm scoured sand from eight miles of dunes and caused millions of dollars in damage.
At Serenity Point [-- the south end of the island --], waves rolled harmlessly over the verdant tableau, depositing a fresh coating of sand on low-lying land but never reaching homes and streets.
Geologists say Topsail’s movement has been exacerbated by quarterly dredging by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in New River Inlet, which separates the island from Camp Lejeune, the U.S. Marine military base to the north. Deepening the channel speeds the flow of currents through the inlet, which in turn hastens erosion and amplifies the ocean’s pressure on the rear of the island. Canals built by developers and families also have accelerated erosion, geologists say.
Without humans continually replacing sand eroded by storms and dredging channels where sand has accumulated, Topsail would migrate freely to where it could accumulate the most sand from currents and big storms, according to Stanley R. Riggs, a coastal geologist at East Carolina University. It would grow into a higher, stronger barrier to storm surges, he says. Continual grading for roads, bridges, and buildings also restricts the island’s height.
The thought of just how much taxpayer money is spent to protect, rebuild, and effectively subsidize vacation properties that are doomed to destruction, and to disrupt processes that should protect inland areas from tropical weather is very disturbing to me.
I understand the appeal of the beach — of spending time on barrier islands. However, I’ve got to say that I prefer the wild, undeveloped beauty of a place like Assateague Island to the sprawl that’s cropped up in places like Panama City Beach.