farther landward." If property 

 owners installed bulkheads farther 

 from the water, they would 

 decrease the environmental 

 impact on the estuary. 



Tracy Skrabal, a scientist 

 with the North Carolina Coastal 

 Federation, disagrees with 

 Rogers' approach, though she 

 admits rigid structures would have 

 less environmental impact if 

 property owners moved them 

 landward. "That works great in 

 theory," she says. "But nobody is 

 willing to do that in practice. Most 

 people put bulkheads out as far as they are 

 allowed and fill in behind them." 



The Coastal Federation is a nonprofit 

 environmental advocacy group that urges 

 developers to build as far from the 

 shoreline as possible so that the natural 

 inland migration of wetlands can continue. 

 Where homes already exist close to the 

 water's edge, the Coastal Federation 

 promotes marsh-grass planting as the 

 optimal method for shoreline stabilization. 



Skrabal heads the Shorekeeper 

 Project, which restores shorelines through 

 grading, planting marsh grasses and 

 stabilizing with limited amounts of rock, if 

 necessary. Volunteers do all the work in 

 the yards of participating homeowners. 



The Coastal Federation hopes its 

 marsh-planting efforts will demonstrate 

 alternative strategies to property owners, 

 restore estuarine habitat, stop erosion and 

 ensure better water quality along the coast. 

 Since planting marsh grass does not require 

 a permit (though grading and adding riprap 

 would), planting marshes or cultivating 

 existing wetlands costs property owners 

 more effort than money. Individual plants 

 cost 40 cents and are spaced 18 inches 

 apart, making planting marshes more 

 economical than vertical walls or revet- 

 ments, which may cost $50 to $100 per 

 linear foot. 



Still, marsh grasses alone are not 

 enough to stabilize many estuarine 

 shorelines. Rogers has helped to develop a 

 low-cost erosion-control alternative that 



Planting marsh grass decreases erosion 

 along low-energy shorelines. 



makes use of marsh vegetation in combina- 

 tion with vertical wooden breakwaters or 

 riprap sills. "They can be made to work 

 almost anywhere in the North Carolina 

 estuaries," Rogers says. "Existing 

 installations extend from Intracoastal 

 Waterway sites in Brunswick County to 

 brackish water in Currituck Sound to a 40- 

 mile fetch across Pamlico Sound in 

 Frisco." 



In this method, a simple breakwater is 

 placed waterward of the mid-tide line to 

 protect marsh-grass plantings closer to land. 

 The low-profile breakwater dampens wave 

 energy and keeps marshes from eroding. 

 The dense root-mat formed by marsh 

 vegetation further decreases wave energy 

 and prevents erosion at the shore. Property 

 owners can help the process by carefully 

 transplanting and fertilizing the grasses. 



LOOKING TO 

 THE FUTURE 



Chuck Bissette, a contractor with 

 T.D. Eure Construction Co. in Beaufort, 

 says that property owners are willing to use 

 alternatives to bulkheads once they know 

 they are available, especially since the cost 

 is often lower. Still, bulkheads have a 

 certain aesthetic appeal to many 

 homeowners. 



"You can establish a definitive 

 property line with a bulkhead, which is 

 hard to do with a riprap revetment," 

 Bissette says. And if there is a beach 



beyond the erosion-control 

 structure, homeowners can climb 

 over a bulkhead much easier than 

 over the large boulders of a riprap 

 revetment. 



Developers acknowledge that 

 the proposed regulations have the 

 potential to be a huge issue. 

 "Bigger than the ban on coastal 

 hardening," Bissette says, 

 "because estuaries have more 

 parcels of land and more indi- 

 vidual property owners. If there 

 were a ban on bulkheading, the 

 wood-treating lobby, timber 

 council, vinyl and aluminum suppliers — 

 all of them would pitch a fit." But for now, 

 Bissette remains unconcerned about the 

 proposed changes. "I haven't seen the teeth 

 in it," he says. 



"The new regulations are not a big 

 change from the rules already in effect," 

 agrees Crowell of the Division of Coastal 

 Management. "They just spell the rules out. 

 We prefer sloping structures to vertical 

 bulkheads. We are not proposing a ban, only 

 appropriate use." 



At any rate, the regulations are far from 

 finished. The Coastal Resources Commis- 

 sion will continue to solicit comments from 

 the public, and the drafted regulations will be 

 publicized at hearings in the 20 CAMA 

 counties. The commission may then revise 

 the rules in accordance with public response. 

 The regulations will pass through a rules 

 review committee before going to the North 

 Carolina General Assembly for acceptance 

 or rejection. The rules currently under debate 

 won't go into effect until August 2000 at the 

 earliest. 



The public still has plenty of opportuni- 

 ties to get involved. Hearings will be posted 

 in local newspapers, and Coastal Resources 

 Commission meetings are open to the 

 public. "Rules get updated all the time, as 

 people learn about the environment and the 

 physical processes that affect it," Crowell 

 says. 'Twenty years of development along 

 the estuaries reveal some environmental 

 threats. We're trying to encourage appropri- 

 ate use of our resources." □ 



COASTWATCH 27 



