Mayor Dina Long speaks to representatives from the Netherlands and students of the New Jersey Institute of Technology about Sea Bright’s recovery on Sept. 10. Local municipalities impacted by superstorm Sandy collaborated with experts from the Netherlands last week on short- and long-term solutions to make the Jersey Shore safer and more resilient against future storms.
Held on Sept. 10, the second day of the “H209 Forum: Water Challenges for Coastal Cities from the Dutch Delta to New York Harbor” in Sea Bright focused on cuttingedge technologies, solutions and approaches to protect coastal towns.
“Exactly 50 years ago in 1953, there was a devastating flood, and that was a mindset and game-changer in the Netherlands,” Gerard Jongerius of the Henry Hudson 500 Foundation said. “We learned our lessons and how the solutions of those lessons change over time.
Netherlands officials and NJIT students tour a Sea Bright neighborhood to view the post-storm rebuilding, including houses raised to comply with new flood elevation levels. “So, we are now thrilled and willing to share our knowledge to help you.”
The forum began on Sept. 9 with discussion groups in Manhattan and Jamaica Bay, N.Y., focusing on climate change and sea level rise.
On Sept. 10, smaller groups discussed the physical, social and economic impacts of these issues at Sea Bright Borough Hall.
Representatives from other local municipalities such as Oceanport and Middletown, as well as the Army Corps of Engineers and New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), exchanged ideas with officials of the Dutch Delta Commission and the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment that ranged from sand nourishment techniques to types of housing that could be adaptive to changing weather patterns.
“It’s an exchange of knowledge to see what we can do and learn from each other,” Jongerius said.
Mayor Dina Long said the idea of “living with water” is a concept not only familiar to the Netherlands, but also to Sea Bright.
“When you live in Sea Bright, you time your life around the tide,” she told the group.
“We want to be able to keep living here with the water, which is why the steps that we take in the days moving forward are really so important for us.” As part of the forum, Ivette Meijerink of the Dutch Delta Commission shared ways the Netherlands has been working on the Dutch Coastal Vision, an integrated approach to addressing sea level rise with sand nourishment. She demonstrated how different structural systems such as dunes, ports and dikes are used along with different sand nourishment techniques in the Netherlands, which has a diverse, 220-mile coastline.
For example, rather than dredge sand from the ocean to put directly on the beaches, the sand is piled offshore, allowing wave action to push it toward the coast over time.
“We have a special need of protection, because 26 percent of the surface is below sea level and it’s an economically important part of the Netherlands,” Meijerink said.
Jan Peelen of the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment said the strategies cut costs and add a socioeconomic benefit.
The concepts presented in the coastal vision are based on building in concert with nature rather than against it, he said.
“If you build a salt marsh to protect from wave energy, it may not give the safe feeling that a levee does, but it works just as good,” he said.
In exchange, students from NJIT’s Center of Resilient Design shared the plans created for Sea Bright that incorporate the beach culture of the town and focus on climate change, adaptation and resilience from a social, economic and structural point of view.
Donald Cresitello of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers discussed the comprehensive study currently underway to develop a framework for coastal areas that could be used on the national and local levels.
“It’s a framework of strategies, or measures that can be used to address the risks of coastal flooding,” he said.
“We’re trying to improve coastal resilience by pursuing a systems approach to comprehensive risk reduction.”
Mauro Baldanza, office of emergency coordinator for Oceanport, said that while some of the concepts would not be feasible, the forum provided a regional approach to the issues.
“It has been a good experience to hear the different possibilities to solutions that are being offered for storms and flooding,” he said.
“I came specifically to hear what the people from Amsterdam are doing with flooding, because I am deeply concerned about how we can control flooding on the Shrewsbury River.”
Oceanport was inundated with water due to a storm surge from the Shrewsbury River, affecting over 900 homes.
Long said she was thrilled to hear the experts’ ideas.
“It makes me wish we had access to loads of money to make some of that happen,” she said.
“I was honestly interested in the Dutch Delta Commission because it recognizes that there are different types of shorelines, and so they have different solutions to address the different types of shorelines.
“I think the Jersey Shore is very diverse, and I think it’s not just one approach. It’s going to take a combination of approaches.”