ROP

Coastal flooding study provides no solutions for North Shore

Jessica Parks

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers released an interim report last week outlining the impact of coastal storms and flooding on shoreline areas in New York and New Jersey.

The study was conducted with the goal of creating a comprehensive plan to combat future storm risks in the New York-New Jersey Harbor region.  One of the focus areas is the Long Island Sound region, which comprises northern Long Island from Queens to Glen Cove and across the Long Island Sound to include sections of Bronx and Westchester counties.

The report outlines five potential alternatives to address potential flooding. Some involve surge gates at the Throgs Neck in the southeastern Bronx, where the East River enters Long Island Sound, but none will directly address flooding in the north shore of Nassau County.

In an appendix that compiled the comments from the scoping period conducted prior to the release of the interim report, a question was asked about the impact of the flood gates on the western shorelines of the Long Island Sound.

In response, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said that preliminary models have shown that proposed alternatives 2 and 3A may induce flooding in the western Long Island Sound and the New York Bight Apex.

Alternatives 2 and 3A include surge barriers at the Throgs Neck that are also expected to affect the migration of water to estuaries along the Long Island Sound.

Alternative 2 includes a 32,500-linear-foot surge barrier from Sandy Hook, N.J., across the outer harbor to Breezy Point in Queens as well as a similar barrier along the East River, just west of the Throgs Neck.

The report said this proposal “could conceptually broadly address coastal storm surge and wave attack from either the New York Bight or Long Island Sound to the vast majority of the study area.”

Alternative 2 is projected to benefit 94.7 percent of the project’s study area but does not include the north shore of Nassau County.

Alternative 3a involves surge gates at the southern mouth of Arthur Kill, between Woodridge, N.J., and Staten Island; the Verazzano Narrows, between Brooklyn and Staten Island; and the Throgs Neck.

The surge gates would address approximately 58 percent of the study area, which also does not include the North Shore.

Another alternative suggests not drawing up a comprehensive plan but instead continuing to fund flood prevention mechanisms for individual areas.

The planned structural measures as part of the No Action Alternative are “focused on improved coastal risk management and/or resilience at specifically defined buildings or locations in the study area,” according to the report.

The next step will be for the agency to narrow down the five alternatives to one tentative selected plan by January 2020.

The plan will be presented in the Draft Feasibility Report and Tier 1 Environment Impact Statement slated for release in March 2020.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will be holding public hearings in locations throughout the study area and will be accepting comments on the study by mail, email or in person.

Comments on the report will be considered as the study team further analyzes the project alternatives.

 

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