Presque Isle Peninsula is generally low in elevation except for beach 
ridges or dunes which rise to an average elevation of 20 feet above Lake 
Erie low-water datum. The spit varies in width from about 250 feet near 
its root or neck to a maximum of about 14 miles toward the distal end. 
The lakeward shore of the spit is, in general, a flat sandy beach except 
where the neck is protected by seawalls. Its regularity and continuity are 
broken only at points where protective works have altered the natural con- 
tour of the shore line. Presque Isle State Park comprising about 3,200 acres 
occupies practically the entire peninsula. The State has provided adequate 
access roads, but has left the area for the most part in its natural con- 
dition. The park is a popular area for bathing, boating, fishing and other 
outdoor forms of recreation. Its large attendance, totaling over 1,500,000 
persons annually, is drawn mostly from western New York, Pennsylvania, and 
eastern Ohio. The public has free and unrestricted access to the park. 
The Erie City Water Works and U. S. Coast Guard also have installations on 
the peninsula. No pollution likely to endanger the health of bathers 
exists, except possibly on the eastern end of the spit near the harbor 
entrance, where bathing has been restricted at times by park officials. 
Future pollution along the lake shore is possible as residential develop- 
ment along the shore to the west increases. 
The lake shore of the peninsula is exposed to wave attack from the 
southwest through north to northeast. The greater frequency and severity 
of storms from the westerly quadrant and the greater fetch in that direction 
cause a predominant eastward littoral drift. During the period of record 
the supply of beach material from bluffs and streams west of the spit has 
been insufficient to replace material eroded from the neck of the spit. 
Recession of the shore line has been greatest at the root of the peninsula 
pradually decreasing to a nodal point about two-thirds of the length of 
the peninsula from the root, from which point accretion has occurred as 
the eroded material was deposited in that area. On several occasions the 
narrow neck of the peninsula was breached by storm wave action. The earlier 
breaches were closed by natural processes. The Federal government closed 
a breach in 1920-1922 and since has built seawalls and bulkheads on the 
lake shore of the neck to preserve it and thus prevent the loss of protection 
it affords to Erie Harbor. After this portion of the shore was protected, 
the resulting decrease in material supply to more northerly portions in- 
creased the rate of recession of those areas. Successive northward extensions 
of protective bulkheads and groins were made by the State until such measures 
passed the former nodal point. The reduced supply of material moving along- 
shore caused the nodal point to move northward. ‘The most northerly sections 
of bulkhead have been generally ineffective. Kecession has continued and 
the highway in that area was destroyed in 196. 
The District and Division Engineers concluded that the most suitable 
plan of protection and improvement comprises the construction of a continuous 
sand beach created by artificial placement of fill, groins to reduce the 
rate of loss of the proposed sand fill and bulkheads to serve as a last 
line of defense in case of temporary loss of fill. 
It was the opinion of the Board that the plan of protection and improve- 
ment for the neck of the peninsula should be designed to provide uninterrupted 
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