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The Tyranny of Low Expectations Shrinks Any Real Sandy Rebuild Debate

“Don’t Make Waves” Attitude A Grossly Irresponsible Abdication

Spending a quarter a billion dollars on a barrier island highway – “fortified” by sea walls – is the epitome of folly

“The reality is that, in a couple of decades, I don’t think we’re going to be talking about the issues regarding Highway 12 because it’s not going to be there anymore,” said Robert Young, director of the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines at Western Carolina University. “The idea that we are going to keep that highway there – it’s just not going to happen.” […]

Barrier islands can be as ephemeral as dreams. Early residents knew that. They lived on the back side of the islands, away from waves and erosion, and were prepared to move their houses as necessary. ~~~  NATURE’S TOLL ROAD – Rebuilding N.C. 12 threatens the Outer Banks’ existence (read the whole thing – a 4 part series).

Instead of Highway 12, just insert Rt. 35. [Yes, I realize that erosion is far more severe on the Outer Banks than in NJ.]

This is the debate from North Carolina about development on barrier islands that is simply being ignored in NJ.

Instead of a science based effort to plan for the future of NJ’s barrier islands, we get surrender from the so called “environmental critics” of the Christie Administration’s plan to spend $265 million to rebuild a highly vulnerable barrier island roadway that was wiped out by Superstorm Sandy:

“If you do it right, it could be self-sustaining,” said Bennett, who works with private developers to design projects using hardy trees and shrubs that require little water and maintenance. The model for landscaping a coastal highway lies just beyond the south end of Route 35, Bennett says — in the northern natural area of Island Beach State Park, where red cedar trees, hollies and bayberry line the roadway. […]

DeCamp admits that politically the promise to put everything back in place after Sandy is powerful:“The mood of the public is, don’t make waves.” ~~~   Critics: DOT ignoring environmental concerns

What?

First of all it’s our job as professionals and advocates to “make waves”.

But much more importantly: You can’t build a highway on a barrier island and “do it right” and it can never be “self sustaining”.

Numerous other inlets opened and closed along the islands, but nobody much cared because the residents traveled by boat.

Then came the 1900s and the rise of the automobile. The islands had no paved roads – in fact, all of Dare County had no paved roads – but boats brought vehicles to the islands, and soon the Midgett family had started a bus service, driving up and down the sand to carry islanders to the ferry that crossed Oregon Inlet. Four-car ferries started running between Hatteras, Ocracoke and the mainland.

Ironically, this “Don’t make waves” attitude comes at a time when the federal government is beginning to consider coastal processes and understand the nature of coastal risks and is beginning to shift national policy to adapt to vulnerabilities and design more “resilient” communities.

Federal policy now includes incentives to abandon development, to discouraging  rebuilding on, and to purchase high hazard and environmentally sensitive coastal lands.

How lame is it that President Obama’s Executive Order and HUD CDBG regulations have more vision and backbone than NJ’s coastal advocates seem to be able to muster? [calls to landscape a roadway with native vegetation is setting a remarkably low bar].

As I’ve written here for a long time, NJ’s failure to plan for transportation, land use, and overall coastal management in the wake of Sandy originates in Governor Christie’s emotional reaction and pledge to rebuild everything virtually in place as it was before the storm.

The Christie policy of more pumping more sand on the beach, construction of artificial dunes (currently mostly just piles of sand), and partial elevation of rebuilt homes is a costly short term approach that provides a false sense of “safety” and invites even larger future tragedies.

Spending a quarter of a billion dollars on reconstruction of a barrier island highway – “fortified” by sea walls – is the epitome of folly.

The Gov. has made “strategic retreat” a taboo topic of public discussion.

Even relatively minor transportation and land use changes like a smaller footprint for Rt. 35, more investment in bicycles and pedestrian modes of travel, and redesign of communities are not on the agenda.

Major reforms like a ferry and public transit system and no more cars on the barrier islands are viewed as hopelessly utopian.

As I’ve noted, from a regulatory perspective, the “right to rebuild” storm damaged private property provision of CAFRA – greatly magnified by DEP Commissioner Martin’s Order to deregulate rebuilding of public infrastructure – have blocked any public planning process for NJ’s coast (as has opposition to a bill to create a new Coastal Commission to do this planning).

The Christie Administration’s coastal policy has been driven exclusively by the huge economic development interests  – real estate, not science and planning.

The economic interests have seized on that policy – including the press – in a way that makes any real public discussion of planning impossible.

And nothing will begin to change until the coastal advocates can grow a spine and say this publicly.

Of course, when the next Sandy hits, I guarantee Congress will not open the federal treasury to bail NJ out again.

Then, maybe if the private sector real estate interests have to assume all the risks with no public subsidy, they will think a little harder about “rebuild madness”.