The mayor of North Wildwood was brief in his assessment of 13th Avenue.
“The dune has breached,” Patrick Rosenello remarked, while water flowed through a sandy gape on the ever-eroding beach.
For decades, the Jersey Shore town has faced significant coastal erosion, defined by the National Geographic Society as the “wearing away of rocks, earth, or sand on the beach” due to waves, strong storms and sea level rise.
Climate change, which fuels larger and more consistent storm systems with higher waves, has been shown to speed up this process.
North Wildwood officials have taken temporary measures to fend off the encroaching tides during recent winter storms but must wait until spring 2025 or longer for a massive U.S. Army Corps of Engineers beach replenishment to bolster the shoreline.
This month, Rosenello has monitored particular sections of his shore including between 12th and 15th avenues where a dune was recently rebuilt.
After a powerful storm earlier this month brought fierce winds and considerable rainfall to New Jersey, the mayor said all of the 36-block beach was at risk and 10 of those blocks were inaccessible at high tide.
After more harsh weather followed, the first breach of that vulnerable section — at 13th Avenue — was reported over the weekend. A resident, PJ Hondros, posted a video of the breach.
“Now that it’s open it could just get wider at every high tide. What’ll happen is that thing will just keep growing,” Rosenello said Tuesday morning, unable to confirm the latest at the scene amid the ongoing snowstorm.
The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) and North Wildwood have been pitted against each other since 2020 over the future of the city’s slice of shore.
So far, the state has cited the city for unauthorized beach repairs and issued a fine — which has been folded into a larger ongoing $33 million legal battle.
The state declined to comment on the ongoing litigation.
“North Wildwood advised the NJDEP last…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply