Dear Ediitor:

We live on Southport Island adjacent to Hendricks Head Beach, the only public beach on our island. Between our home and the beach, a paved road forms the top of a sea wall that was rebuilt following The Blizzard of ’78.  In the storm of January 2024, the highest since ’78, sea water again overflowed the road and tore it up. Since that time consultants have been working on plans to raise the seawall to protect the road and beach parking lot. For no apparent reason, the plan also includes raising the road and placing a huge 6-foot x 12-foot culvert under that road to replace an 18-inch, 48-year-old functioning drain. The cost to Southport would be $292,000. Bill Royall has presented a bid of $200,000 to raise the wall. Repaving is $60,000 maximum.

Across from the beach a ¼ acre wetland marsh currently drains into Sheepscot Bay through an 18” iron pipe that was placed during the seawall repair in 1978, and has worked well since that time.  It serves several valuable functions. It isolates the marsh from the ocean, keeping road pollution runoff from the beach, and saltwater out of the marsh and abutters’ wells

The designers have said that the purpose of the huge 6’x12’ culvert is to allow drainage from a flooded roadway. Then they will half-fill the culvert with rocks and sand to slow the drainage and reproduce the slope of the existing pipe. Others have said that, following any 1-year ocean storm, much of the loose material in the culvert could wash out entirely. Also, much of the beach sand in front of the culvert would wash away when the tide recedes, and tides would batter the marsh twice a day.

Other effects to the beach include a loss of the smooth stable walkway at the top of the seawall, and the dangerous elevation from seawall to beach of 10 feet, compared to 4-5 feet today. The 6-foot high by 60-foot-long culvert would become an attractive nuisance for children of all ages (exploration, parties, bonfires, fireworks, etc.).

The designers’ construction time estimate is one year. Cost and time on road projects are never conservative.

Gene and Katie Eves

Southport