By Maddy Vitale
Ocean City awarded a $2.3 million contract to restore the badly eroded neighboring Shooting Island to turn it into a wildlife refuge, storm buffer and potential site for dredge materials.
The nearly 150-acre island off Ocean City will be transformed into a “living shoreline” under a proposed project to rebuild it after decades of erosion. The contract, approved at a Nov. 8 City Council meeting, is with Charter Contracting Company of Boston, according to Ocean City Public Information Officer Doug Bergen.
Bergen said work will begin this winter and the project will be funded by a grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
Video Credit: Jonathan Moraglia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMwyPhFtGV0
City Council President Peter Madden said of the plan, “The project gives the city a chance to help the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation experiment with wetlands restoration. It should be a win for the environment, for property owners and for local taxpayers.”
The project is specifically for wetland restoration/enhancement and restoration of the 1978 shoreline on Shooting Island, which is an uninhabited bay island located in the Cape May Wetlands Wildlife Management Area in Great Egg Harbor Bay in Cape May County, according to Bergen.
He explained the work is intended to enhance the coastal resiliency and help reduce impacts of storms by creating a buffer. https://accessglobal.media.clients.ellingtoncms.com/siteimports/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Shooting_Island__1_-1.pdf
The island has experienced significant erosion for more than 80 years and, in some areas, the shoreline has receded up to 60 feet. Under the plan, more than 150 acres of the tidal wetlands would be restored and protected.
The two main components are construction of about 3,200 linear feet of living shoreline rock sill to protect existing marsh and allow for further development of marsh on the island and construction of approximately 1,900 linear feet of living shoreline using oyster “castles.” The oyster castles are man-made block-like structures, like Legos, that provide the ideal habitat for shellfish.
Shooting Island is off of Tennessee Avenue and is a crucial part of the city’s extensive dredging program to clear out sediment-choked lagoons and channels along the back bays.
An image taken from Google Maps shows the location of Shooting Island in the back bay off Ocean City.
Sediment dredged from the back bays will be used to restore Shooting Island, inspiring the “living shoreline” name of the project.
In July, during a public hearing on the project at City Hall, ACT Engineers, the city’s dredging consultants, explained some of the aspects of the proposal.
An added benefit of the project, the firm said, would be to create a buffer against storms sweeping off the bay.
“In order to preserve the island, and preserve the city, Shooting Island has to withstand the impact and continue to break energy across the bay,” Eric Rosina, an executive with ACT Engineers, said during the July 25 meeting.
Ocean City officials looked to an acclaimed restoration project in the Chesapeake Bay as proof that dredge material can be successfully used to help rebuild islands.
Poplar Island, in the Chesapeake Bay off Maryland, spanned more than 1,100 acres in the mid-1800s, but shrank to five acres by the 1990s due to erosion caused by waves, winds and tidal currents.
Now, Poplar Island is being rebuilt by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers using material dredged from the approach channels to the Chesapeake Bay.
Bergen said ACT Engineers will have more information about the Shooting Island project after meetings next week.
The restoration of Poplar Island in the Chesapeake Bay off Maryland is seen as a model for rebuilding the wetlands at Shooting Island. (Courtesy U.S. Army Corps of Engineers)
