2. BEACHSIDE BARRIERS T


he sea inundated dozens of inhabited barrier islands along the New Jersey coast


during Superstorm Sandy. The flood- ing devastated thousands of residents, but experts weren’t surprised. Barrier islands are formed as sea


levels rise, moving sand and sediment into offshore formations. In their natural state, barrier islands can act as shock absorbers in a storm by blunting the force of waves before they hit the shore. But on the East Coast, many of these natural forma- tions have been paved over and devel- oped—which amplifies the effects of flooding. The story of New Jersey’s Barnegat


Bay provides a lesson in contrasts. Hurricane Sandy displaced thousands of homeowners along the Barnegat Bay estuary, a 42-mile-long lagoon that hugs the suburban enclaves of 50 · LAND&PEOPLE · SPRING/SUMMER 2013


Brick and Tom’s River down through Forked River and beyond. But they still fared better than residents of Mantoloking, a barrier island on the ocean side of the bay that was nearly wiped from the map. The estuary residents benefited


from the buffering effect of Island Beach State Park—the largest unde- veloped barrier island in New Jersey, says Stanton Hales, director of the Barnegat Bay Partnership. “There’s no doubt in my mind that had it not been for the protections provided by the intact dunes and wet- lands in places like Island Beach State Park, many spots along the bay would have been much more extensively damaged,” says Hales. Starting in 1990, The Trust for


Public Land began marshaling the funds to purchase more than 12,000 acres of land on and around Barnegat


In their natural state, barrier islands can act as shock absorbers in a storm by blunting the force of waves hitting the shore.


Bay for conservation. Of that land, more than 3,000 acres were inun- dated by the storm surge during Sandy. If those acres had housed townhomes instead of open space, the impact of the storm could have been that much worse. Keeping these kinds of low-lying


areas undeveloped is a viable strategy for protecting coastal communities, says Adrian Benepe. Already, The Trust for Public Land has begun using GIS mapping to determine where the Sandy storm surge penetrated the coastline. With this information, planners can understand which areas are most vulnerable—and develop a strategy to protect them from future storms.


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