Avalon Sand Transfer Plan Irks Affected Residents

AVALON – The series of March storms that pummeled Cape May County beaches left little time for assessment and reaction as a new storm always seemed to follow on the heel of the previous one. 
The result is a need to address specific beach problems in a very tight time frame before the summer begins. 
In Avalon, the area most in need of help is the north end, the beaches from about 10th to 14th streets.
With no federal replenishment available, the borough is turning to a method used in 2016, back passing. That is the taking of sand from areas in the middle and southern ends of the borough and trucking that sand to the north end.
At a Borough Council meeting April 11, some residents near the planned borrow area from 32nd to 36th streets spoke in opposition to the plan.
Armed with pictures of a gully that formed after the back passing in 2016, the residents argued that the earlier back passing experience seriously harmed their entire summer experience. 
The gully they attributed to the back-passing activity was a barrier which made it difficult to get to the dry sand.
The residents pushed for a solution that would take sand from beaches further south, spreading the burden of supplying the north end.
What may seem like a simple matter of moving sand from one place to another is not at all simple. Such activity is subject to what can be an onerous permit acquisition process.
The borough potentially has three borrow areas from which it can, with permits, take sand from one set of beaches and restore into north-end beaches from which that same sand probably eroded.
The natural movement of sand from north to south has been studied through the efforts of the borough’s relationship with Stockton University’s Coastal Research Center.
What is called the north borrow area consists of beaches from 32nd to 40th streets. There is a south borrow from 60th to 80th streets. The in-between beaches, from 40th to 60th streets are complicated because of their use as a nesting area for protected shorebirds.
Borough Engineer Thomas Thornton explained at the council meeting that the borough did not have the time needed to alter the borrow area to more southern beaches. 
Selecting the area that had been used in 2016 sped the process in a situation where the start of the summer season is fast approaching.
He also said that the plans for borrowing sand from the 24th and 25th street beach areas involved much less sand that was taken in 2016, and a footprint for the beach area from which the sand would come that was 80 feet closer to the water than in 2016.
By moving the impacted area further east, toward the water and away from the dunes, and by taking 35,000 cubic yards of sand instead of 50,000 as in 2016, Thornton said the impact on the borrow area should be significantly less. 
Thornton also said that the borough would push remaining sand back over the area from which sand was taken for transport north.
Thornton said that the borough should look into meeting requirements that would allow beaches in the southern borrow area to be available for use in the future.
For this year, the back-passing plan will continue using sand from the mid-30th streets’ beaches.
To contact Vince Conti, email vconti@cmcherald.com.