THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 15, 1995 TAG: 9510130222
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 06 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Medium: 60 lines
As a bayfront resident of Chesapeake Beach, I must take exception to the decisions and statements as reported in ``Dredging to supply sand for beaches'' (Beacon, Oct. 8). The city of Virginia Beach and the Bridge-Tunnel Commission's decision to deny sand to the beach next to the new bridge is unconscionable and may result in the failure of the adjacent bulkheads similar to what is happening at Sandbridge.
Nowhere else on Virginia Beach's bayfront is the absence of sand more calamitous than the area between the restaurant Alexander's on the Bay and the bridge-tunnel. Even during periods of midtide, portions of this area are impassable due to the erosion of beach sand over the years. Yet this is the very area that will be directly and adversely affected when the new channel is dredged to build the parallel span. After the channel has been dredged and construction has moved on, the ever-shifting sand will gradually fill in the channel with the adjacent sand. The already sparse beach front at the 4600 block of Ocean View Avenue may disappear totally. When James K. Brookshire, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel Commission states, ``This seems to work out real well for everybody,'' he certainly isn't considering the well-being of the adjacent property owners.
The residents of Chesapeake Beach and Baylake Pines had better wake up now before the driving of 5,000 or more concrete piles wake them up next spring. Consider what a floating 48-inch dredge pipe will mean next summer: no more launching boats from the beach, cancel the Low Rent Regatta and kiss the beautiful view and quiet beach goodbye for a year. Add to this the occasional oil spill with floating construction debris and it becomes clear that Chesapeake Beach will have to bear the detrimental effects of building the bridge while being denied any of the beneficial results.
More than any other are, Chesapeake Beach desperately needs at least a portion of this dredged material. Of the estimated 70,000 cubic yards to be removed if just 20 percent could be placed on the adjacent property, it would mean a strip of beach 100 feet wide by 4 feet high and almost 1,000 feet long. Moreover, it would cost considerably less than moving the sand to the Lesner Bridge area and it might help offset the loss of sand when the channel starts filling itself back in.
The statement that the decision to pump sand onto bayfront beaches was dismissed because some of the property owners were unwilling to grant public easements is not entirely true or realistic. The public now enjoys riparian rights all along the beaches; they can walk from Lynnhaven inlet to Little Creek naval base unimpeded. Also, about one-third of the area that would require public easements is currently underwater anyway.
All of which makes me suspect that the real reasons Chesapeake Bay sand is going to the Oceanfront are (1) there are no tourist dollars being spent on our beach and (2) unlike Sandbridge, our homes are not toppling into the water - yet.
Brian V. Camden
Ocean View Avenue by CNB