The Sandbridge Beach Restoration Project has been named by the American Shore and Beach Preservation Association (ASBPA) as one of the beast restored beaches for 2017.
This renourishment project is located in the city of Virginia Beach and has been re-nourished four times since 1998. An estimated 7.8 million cubic yards of sand have been placed on five miles of beach with a total cost of $43.8 million.
“This project shows how a town, private landowners and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers can come together to protect houses; and that a community can find creative ways to fund their share of the project by creating a local tax district. The community could have armored the shoreline with higher seawalls and rip-rap, but choose instead to undertake a beach nourishment project to restore their beach,” ASBPA said in its release.
The restored beach has increased the coastal resiliency of this shore while returning much needed sand to the littoral system.
Prior to the restoration, there was no high-tide beach along this section of shoreline. The residents and the city proactively worked with the USACE to develop a federal project that not only restored the beach and dune ecosystem but dramatically reduced property damage and loss from severe storms.
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