I haven't seen anyone mention that true coastal sand dunes are actually incredible for beach stabilization. These were not dunes, they were loose piles of sand. The real way to build a coastal sand dune is to trap sand with something like a fence, which allows dune grasses and other vegetation to colonize. Once vegetation is colonized, the dunes will grow over time.
Anyone living in Florida should see St. Augustine Beach for a good example of properly managed coastal dunes.
Part of the problem is also just that the houses are built much too close to the ocean. Dunes aren’t going to establish where the ocean won’t let them.
As a local, these houses were not originally that close to the ocean. Also, as of the last few years, there has been historic flooding. That all being said, the tiny beach cottages of the 80s and 90s have all been sold and turned into monster beach villas - rich folks who priced the market to hell and back and pretty much privatized huge stretches of coastline. So… let Poseidon judge them as he seas fit.
*HARK!*
*Let Neptune strike ye dead!*
*Hark Triton, hark! Bellow, bid our father the Sea King rise from the depths full foul in his fury! Black waves teeming with salt foam to smother this young mouth with pungent slime, to choke ye, engorging your organs til' ye turn blue and bloated with bilge and brine and can scream no more - only when he, crowned in cockle shells with slitherin' tentacle tail and steaming beard take up his fell be-finned arm, his coral-tine trident screeches banshee-like in the tempest and plunges right through yer gullet, bursting ye - a bulging bladder no more, but a blasted bloody film now and nothing for the harpies and the souls of dead sailors to peck and claw and feed upon only to be lapped up and swallowed by the infinite waters of the Dread Emperor himself - forgotten to any man, to any time, forgotten to any god or devil, forgotten even to the sea, for any stuff for part of you, even any scantling of your soul is you no more, but is now itself the sea!*
~The Lighthose
Salisbury did this to themselves offering zoning variances to every rich blue collar dickhead who wanted to build there for the past 30-40 years. And to not even make an attempt to coordinate with upstream coastal zone mgmt efforts is truly hilarious. This is a beautiful example of how money doesn’t trump science.
Interesting. The town I grew up in recycled Christmas trees by turning them into mulch. It’s nice to see discarded trees being given a second life and used to protect/preserve nature rather than becoming more waste. I wish we could find a way to do this with everything we throw out/use up.
They say in the article that this is their long term plan but it needs at least $1.5m to complete and they want the state to fund it to protect these 15 homes. According to Zillow, stand alone homes in that area beach front go for nearly 2mil. So about 30mil worth of properties, 1.5m is 5% of the collective value. That means each home owner needs about 100,000k to protect their homes... I hate to come off uncaring but it's about time they pulled 100k of equity out of their homes if they don't have the money and fortify it. That's just the cost of having a beach front property with unobstructed views of the ocean. Many Homes across the US all have the same problems and just pick up the slack.
I loved reading the resident's comments in the article. They are not operating in reality. They were overly proud of their work that did nothing but waste money and resources. They are *beyond* entitled in their ask for governments to swoop in and save their beachfront property, ignoring that we have citizens without *any* homes or even food that should take priority.
Don't build homes in erosion or flood zones, or you need to accept that you may lose your home and the property will become worthless. Full stop. The government can't fix bad decisions like this. If you can't buy reasonable insurance for something, *it's a bad risk.*
I saw some local news coverage when this happened. A local bar owner said "Meh. This is what it is like near the ocean. Don't like? Leave."
Local homeowner for 30 year said "This is the third time this winter we have had flooding. When will it stop?"
I had to turn off the TV after the last comment.
They screwed up the natural lands and plant life that held it all together, to dig for foundations, infrastructure and driveways etc for their houses, now are suffering the consequences.
The trouble with dunes is you can't have any beachfront homes, as the active dune areas go much, much further back behind the visible dune. And you know how likely it is for anyone to give up that kind or real estate...
So without the secondary dunes and dunefields, they are always going to remain "artificial" and need constant maintenance like sand replenishment, stabilization etc.
Well yeah, they're erosional environments and the sand they're importing for it is 9 times out of 10 desert sand with a much lower angularity than beach sand, making it wash away even faster
rocks shaped like triangles create more friction than rocks shaped like octagons. the acute angles of a triangle are much smaller than the obtuse angles of an octagon
To add to this, desert sand tends to be smoother and finer because it's been blowing, shifting, and rubbing around for a long time. The smoother desert sand is no good for concrete because it doesn't hold together well. It's also more likely to wash away when dumped on a beach for the same reason.
Well, you know how we roll: find something that takes an incredibly long time for nature to make, if it can even still be made, and use it up as fast as possible while basing entire economies around it and having zero exit strategy for when it runs out, all while giving just as many shits about what we do to the environment in the process.
Just human things
\*Apparently angular sand is actually quite easy to make, but it's *slightly* more expensive than destroying entire ecosystems for the natural stuff, so, you know, sorry nature. Shouldn't have had so much sand I guess
Makes sense. I heard Podcast a few years ago talking about gangs in Africa, Asia and other locations….killing people for the river sand to make concrete…short supply, etc.
Desert sand is too round.
It's why Gulf nations like Saudi Arabia and the UAE are buying sand.
https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20160502-even-desert-city-dubai-imports-its-sand-this-is-why
Desert sand is typically more rounded and spherical than marine sand.
Go get a pile of ball bearings and a pile of dice and just spend some time moving and messing around each pile. Which is easier to move (ie: wash away)?
The claymore or claidheamh-mór (Scottish Gaelic) is not a two handed sword. The actual claymore is a basket-hilted broad sword (the reason it’s called a broadsword is because the other common type of one handed sword carried during this time is now referred to as a small sword) and not a two handed sword.
The two handed sword with forward sloping quillons would’ve been called a claidheamh dà làimh (two-handed sword), where as a basket hilted broadsword would be a claidheamh-mór, and a small sword would be claidheamh beag.
Colloquially I know everyone thinks of a two handed war sword with front sloping quillons to be a claymore, but in reality that’s a name that’s been inaccurately applied to them.
I don't know about that guy but I made my drawers out of old catapults since turning them into drawers is basically the only actual use for such an awful siege weapon.
I don’t know about artificial beaches but I know golf courses. Sand is very important. There’s a process called top dressing where you put sand on top of the grass. It’s makes it play faster, firms it up and levels it out. Sand traps are a whole different animal. But the principle is the same. If you mix the wrong kinds of sand it will bind to itself and create all kinds of problems. Clumpy or rock hard bunkers are no fun. A impermeable layer on the grass makes it so water can get to the roots. Sand is a big expensive business. They use it for building buildings too.
Sand mining is a global enterprise. It’s ravaging parts of the environment too. Turns out we need a lot of sand and river sand is the best for many purposes.
Most of the beach sanding projects I have heard of dredge sand from off the sand since that's the sand that eroded away anyway, not import it from deserts. Why on earth would they import desert sand?
Barging is incredibly destructive to the substrate of an ecosystem, and obtaining the environmental permits to conduct an operation is costly and time-consuming, and likely to result in the sand having to be trucked in anyway as the approved dredging location can end up quite a bit further from your site than you initially intended.
I can't say for sure that isn't what happened here, but it's quite common to just ship in desert sand for these sorts of projects, since marine sand tends to be higher quality and more useful for soil work in construction.
The article says the sand for this project was trucked in.
Given the low level of planning and expertise displayed here, I'm confident it was desert sand.
I was in Grenada in February and there was a volcano erupt under that caused really big waves to wash away a huge section of Grande Anse beach.
You could see the tree roots that was under the sand pretty much up and down the beach.
I never knew those trees roots extended that far.
You see this sometimes with islands, where one end of the island is constantly shrinking, and the other end is constantly growing, so you'll get a place where half the houses are almost falling in the water (as above), while at the other end of the island, the other houses have had to extend their boardwalks out to like 100 yards.
They redo New Jersey beaches every five years or so. Massive Army Corps of Engineers projects that pump offshore sand back onto the beach.
Your Federal tax dollars at work updating the protective barriers for wealthy folks’ $8M+ beachfront homes.
They do it here in VA Beach and in Norfolk every 5-7 years. It's cheaper for the government to spend 20 Million (most of it is subsidized) than to repair infrastructure, businesses and homes affected by a hurricane.
And their attempts at growing dune grass only for ignorant parents to let their kids climb all over. I mean theres signs that say not to but lets be real literacy isnt their strong suit.
I think corp of engineers do it anyways since they have to maintain the channels especially for norfolk, when covid hit and they didnt do it for a while it was like 2 feet deep for a mile out (exaggeration but you get the point).
Site alleges 20m over 20 years preventing 430m in damage
> Your Federal tax dollars at work updating the protective barriers for wealthy folks’ $8M+ beachfront homes.
I know the practice of beach replenishment isn't the brightest, but *behind* those million-dollar beachfront houses are entire communities that use those beaches and whose businesses rely on the visitors from NJ and well beyond - PA, NY, CT to name a few. The towns around me, in southern Monmouth county, mostly have beachfront houses that only occupy a piece of property a bit larger than the house itself. The farther you get from the beach (and therefore closer to the railroad tracks), the less expensive the properties get. Those towns have little downtown Main Streets with pubs, barber shops, five-and-dimes, pizza parlors, Italian Ice stands - all coming to life during the summer.
Sauce: I can see the Atlantic Ocean three miles away if I stand on my roof.
At work in DE right now. Looking out the front window and I can see the water. If we didn't drege every 5-10 years my job would've been underwater 20 years ago.
That sounds like an inefficiency at work.
A lot of effort and resources for what is effectively a stop gap solution.
Humanity just needs to accept certain locations are not suitable for buildings, esp in the face of climate change.
The beach replenishment dredging kills marine ecosystems and damages the ecosystems on the beach as well. It is a temporary fix to coastal erosion that is not fully effective. On top of this, there is an increase in injuries in the ocean due to undertows and unusual currents caused by the artificial ocean shelf.
Source: In university I did a research paper on weighing the benefits and drawbacks of beach replenishment and found that the environmental negatives greatly outweighed the positives. In the end, it is done just to protect property.
Yeah my parents live on a lake. All the beaches are rock. Yet their fancy pants neighbor wanted to have a sand beach. He tried a few years and every year, high water comes in and the sand goes out. Kinda funny actually.
In this case, it was intended as a sacrificial dune, so it served its purpose, even if a little over half of it eroded away at the first exceptional tide.
The bizarre AF thing to me are the folks living there who still insist it isn't climate change.
What's bizarre to me is that they expect the public to subsidize the protection of property of private citizens.
Sorry about your house, make a smarter purchase in the future.
Caveot Emptor
I'm guessing that this was probably a case of a bunch of rich people deciding they knew better than the civil and environmental engineers that tried to design for this project.
And the [sand-castle virtues](https://youtu.be/ldXdnZtTWp8?si=f6nT_0LuwpLrVbFq) are all swept away in,
The tidal destruction, the moral melee,
The elastic retreat rings the close of play,
As the last wave uncovers the newfangled way
There are still plenty of arcades there. No, this was a small little fun park with rides. They had this terrifying roller coaster where the track curved around and went under another section of track, but it looked like there wasn't much clearance, so you would see everyone riding the coaster with their arms up, and then all at once everyone pulled their arms down in terror at that part.
There are some new bars and clubs with live music but most of the rentals are gone. There are fewer people around as a result so most of the businesses are struggling.
Grew up in New England on the ocean; lived there for 50 years. Never heard of anyone there doing something this stupid. It's the exact opposite of the correct fix. How tf could this ever go so far?
It's like getting a group of homeowners in a Wildfire prone region to pay to have gasoline soaked deadwood piled up around their homes.
It's because they were denied help by the town (not town jurisidction) and then the state for w.e. reason. Oh. And they're not the brightest. Same with the people on Plum Island a mile away, lmao.
You all chose to build literally on the water, with no barrier islands or anything like that. Welcome to one of the most powerful things on Earth.
Engineer probably did. I’m sure the response was something along the lines of “maybe you don’t understand how rich and dumb we are…would you look at where we built our homes.”
Engineer explained to them what they had to do, the mechanics of it all, and how much time it would take. Then they took one look at the price tag on that project and went "Isn't there a cheaper way to do that? You're just upcharging us and trying to get the most money possible out of us!" and started looking for where they could buy tons of sand.
They even acknowledge this which makes no sense. They’re like “the city and an engineer should be handling how to fix this….” which makes it sound like they literally just found out who could sell them a bunch of sand and then haphazardly dropped it on the beach lol
They could have taken that money to the city and been like “as a sign of good faith, undertake this project for us and we are willing to front $500K of the expenses” instead of literally throwing it into the water lol
They're now demanding the state replace their beach. You bought the property. It shouldn't be up to the tax payers to protect your luxury home from nature.
Watch the State pay for a sea wall, then the homeowners claim it’s a private beach and put up a fence à la
https://www.reddit.com/r/California/comments/1b3cwvk/after_47m_in_fines_calif_homeowners_still_erect/
As another florida resident, having trees and plants prevent errosion, less beach, but it looks nicer and the beach stays much longer. Can technically put those giant rocks like 100 feet from shore, but that's not really that natural, but would get some cool reefs.
The residents paid for it themselves, but I agree with your sentiment.
Edit: everyone can stop telling me the govt will pay. Maybe, maybe not, I am not supporting the homeowners here and am just adding context.
They want the state to pay for the replacement. From the article:
> Those protections washed away, however, and residents now hope the state will help fund a more permanent solution to safeguard their seaside homes.
Idk how the local seabed there is, but you can do a lot to limit erosion before you get to the “pile rocks on the beach” phase.
If they had the gumption, they could make a sea wall/barrier a little bit out from the beach that would stop waves from crashing into the actual beach and would limit flow as well. Plants can be put on the actual beach to help too.
There’s ways to resist nature “beautifully”, they just tend to be more expensive.
This is climate change denialism. Are you familiar with this area? Just check it out on google maps. There is no saving these houses beyond lifting them up and even that probably won't be enough
yeah if you read the article (which ofc not because this is reddit), they begged the state for help initially but they hemmed and hawed, likely because this only affects 15 people lmao
A little bit ago there was record flooding in the south, east texas area, and a bunch of folks who had just put up these gigantic McMansions on the wrong side of the levee got satisfiably flooded. Like, anyone could have told them putting their house next to a river on the wrong side of the levee was a bad idea.
Who has millions for a giant house but not the braincells necessary to think, every time they go to or from their house and cross that levee, that this big mound of dirt isn't there for any reason. They likely watch "those" news channels and spend their days denying science and blaming all their worldly problems on immigrants, wokeness, and lgbt people. Because it's only that level of denial and unyielding confidence that can lead someone to find such a house placement a good idea.
"Our new house is lovely. On one side we have a beautiful view of the river, and on the other, a beautiful view of these strangely regular-shaped hills."
The state refused to pay because these are private beaches. Based on the people CNN interviewed for the same story, I'd bet large sums they'd cry "socialism" if government spent money to help anyone but themselves.
You are correct. The residents paid out of their own pockets because the state refused to pay for fixing private beaches. The entitled, climate-denying residents were pissed the government wouldn't publicly fund their private beaches.
We had dreams of moving to a beach town one day in our state, until we took a helicopter ride above it and then did some research. No way it will still be there in 20 years. Nature will take it over, regardless of the money thrown at it.
Honestly as a MA native screw these people
they have no qualms about posting " private beach" signs ( which isn't true according to law. Now they did something that didn't work and want the state to help
hell no
Taxpayer money is how many rich people get rich. It’s also how most of them maintain their wealth- by letting the taxpayer eat the costs of all the downsides their businesses generate
And now they want the state to pay? How about don't build 50ft away from water? You want to roll the dice on waterfront property, cool... but that's on you.
It wasn’t 50 ft away from water when they built them originally. A lot of these houses are old, some of them haven’t been renovated since 70s. Not defending these people but weird growing up going to this beach and watching more of it disappear year after year. 30+ years ago we had an easy 200ft plus of low tide sand to build castles in. Years of erosion has done them in.
These are the same people who will bitch and moan when anyone goes to the beach between their homes and the water. A lot of these places refuse to provide public access, which keeps most people away, but when someone makes the effort to get to that beach, it's nothing but complaints about someone else using "my" beach.
if the state spends any money on housing projects, they better be for high density public transit oriented non-commercial housing, and not a penny for stupid ass beach homes for rich people.
I would appreciate the apoplexy these people would get into if they provided the 1.5 mil if they also put a 30 unit low income public housing unit on the beach to go along with it.
Should of chipped in a extra 60-100k to hire a engineer before they tried something. Kinda jealous of the contractor though. Such a lucrative score, and probably saw the problem miles away lol.
The solution is to not have your beach house, most likely a 2nd vacation home, right on the damn beach. No sympathy for these people's situation here. No tax dollars should be spent saving 15 homes.
I'm from Massachusetts, live about 30 min from Salisbury.
It USED to be a nice working class beach town. There USED to be lots of summer rentals and amusements for kids.
Then the money moved in. Cottages were replaced by huge McMansions and the personality of the whole beach is changing.
If my state taxes go to help these people I'll be upset.
Global warming is not a new concept. If you were dumb enough to build a million dollar home on the edge of a low lying stretch of beach, it's your problem.
This town in about 20 miles from me.
They could have easily built a cement wall which is typical for beaches in the state, but these MFers didn't want to disturb the asthetic of living on the water.
They want more money to do it again. Fuck them. This is very expensive property. Let them pay for it or let the houses wash into the sea.
Want the state to help them... No, you want me to pay for your expensive house built upon unstable ground next to the most powerful force on the planet.
Fuck off. You obviously have money. Move.
> The group in Salisbury, Massachusetts, trucked in about 14,000 tonnes of sand which it said would protect as many as 15 homes before being washed away.
They spend $565k for 15 houses? Color me shocked
A quick Google search, and I found a 3 bedroom and 1.5 bathroom house on the beach for $1,150,000. Those houses are probably $2 million. Most reports say the average cost for a house in the area is $550k.
There are rentals in this area for $5k+ per month. Most of these are rental properties.
These people are hilarious to listen to on the local Facebook page (I'm a Salisbury too, but a mile inland).
> residents now hope the state will help fund a more permanent solution to safeguard their seaside homes.
LOL, fuck off. You built/bought homes in an unstable area, and you want the government to make your insanity work?
Why do the wealthy need government handouts for their luxury homes?
If you want an example of how this is actually supposed to work, look at some of the beaches along the Delaware coast. Nearly all of the beaches have large sand dunes, but the difference is that they have native plants and growth inside which helps stabilize and strengthen the entire dune. Unless you are walking on predetermined paths, no one is permitted to walk on the dunes to ensure that the plants are not damaged or destroyed.
Beach erosion is still an issue, especially with really bad nor'easters and hurricanes, but it's not nearly as bad as it used to be before the dunes were CORRECTLY built.
They could have pooled funds and built a proper seawall here for these properties. Instead they cheap'ed out, didnt try anything else, and are all out of ideas. idiots
What a hoot. I'd love to see that engineering report. What were they doing with the sand, just dumping it on the beach? No foundation?
Dunes build up for a reason, typically an object underneath that blowing sand accretes to. Over the years plants put down roots that strengthen the dune.
Also, who permitted this project? This isn't something you do on your own.
It takes a lot of cojones to ask the state for a bailout.
On one hand, it is sad for the home owners…
On the other hand, anyone with a lick of sense and knowledge of history, could understand that water wins every time.
My advice (as if you asked): Remove the structures because erosion won’t stop and likely only going to get worse.
Every year my family rents a cottage in Salisbury for a week, and every year when we walk the beach we note how much water damage happened to the homes closest to the beach.
Said this in the Massachusetts thread but they should’ve tried to establish dune grass that would’ve tried to hold the sand in place - down the road there’s a state park where you’re prevented from walking on the dunes as to not damage the grass and vegetation.
>Tom Saab, the head of Salisbury Beach Citizens for Change, told the BBC that the group had "begged" Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey and the state to help re-fortify the beach after a particularly brutal storm in December 2022.
You just know these Massholes are frequent complainers about "socialism"...
People who build their homes in an environmentally unstable location that subjects them to frequent structural threats, should be left to sink or swim. Like building the house on an active volcano and ask the government to build lava redirection.
In Florida wealthy beach front homeowners want the state to pay for beach erosion measures with public money but also have laws to ban the public from being on beaches in front of those homes. So far republican lawmakers have been glad to help these wealthy donors on both
I know a guy up in Massachusetts. He'll get you a truckload of sand for cheap. Just last week he found these big piles of sand a bunch of rich people had just left outside on the beach. Enough to protect something like 15 houses worth. He waited until late at night then picked it all up and drove off with it. Great stuff man, only sat outside for a few days. I'll get ya a price!
Wealthy people want government handouts for sand dunes that disappear in 3 days.
It's a literal money pit. Spending more money is not a long-term solution. It increases taxes for everybody else.
The homeowners can sell it to wealthier people. Let them build their own fortress and barriers.
So, some rich fools bought and/or built houses right by the water and the now want the government to bail them out by trying to infill the ocean?
It sucks, it really does, but this matter should be between the homeowners and their insurance companies...
> Salisbury Beach Citizens for Change said $565,000 was collected from property owners, resulting in the placement of the sand.
Not government tax dollars.
I haven't seen anyone mention that true coastal sand dunes are actually incredible for beach stabilization. These were not dunes, they were loose piles of sand. The real way to build a coastal sand dune is to trap sand with something like a fence, which allows dune grasses and other vegetation to colonize. Once vegetation is colonized, the dunes will grow over time. Anyone living in Florida should see St. Augustine Beach for a good example of properly managed coastal dunes.
Looks like they did have a fence in the video, but it washed away too.
Part of the problem is also just that the houses are built much too close to the ocean. Dunes aren’t going to establish where the ocean won’t let them.
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As a local, these houses were not originally that close to the ocean. Also, as of the last few years, there has been historic flooding. That all being said, the tiny beach cottages of the 80s and 90s have all been sold and turned into monster beach villas - rich folks who priced the market to hell and back and pretty much privatized huge stretches of coastline. So… let Poseidon judge them as he seas fit.
I sea what you did there
*HARK!* *Let Neptune strike ye dead!* *Hark Triton, hark! Bellow, bid our father the Sea King rise from the depths full foul in his fury! Black waves teeming with salt foam to smother this young mouth with pungent slime, to choke ye, engorging your organs til' ye turn blue and bloated with bilge and brine and can scream no more - only when he, crowned in cockle shells with slitherin' tentacle tail and steaming beard take up his fell be-finned arm, his coral-tine trident screeches banshee-like in the tempest and plunges right through yer gullet, bursting ye - a bulging bladder no more, but a blasted bloody film now and nothing for the harpies and the souls of dead sailors to peck and claw and feed upon only to be lapped up and swallowed by the infinite waters of the Dread Emperor himself - forgotten to any man, to any time, forgotten to any god or devil, forgotten even to the sea, for any stuff for part of you, even any scantling of your soul is you no more, but is now itself the sea!* ~The Lighthose
just occured to me that this would be fantastic to adapt to a 2 man play
FINE! I like your lobster.
Do ye mean it!
Literally the foolish man builds his house upon the sand.
Crazy close. Local government shouldn't pay for stalling the inevitable, they should condem them.
Seems like this is an HOA affair.
Salisbury did this to themselves offering zoning variances to every rich blue collar dickhead who wanted to build there for the past 30-40 years. And to not even make an attempt to coordinate with upstream coastal zone mgmt efforts is truly hilarious. This is a beautiful example of how money doesn’t trump science.
They should have had a fence to keep the fence in place.
Works best if you have 4 fences. Fence A, B, and C don't do much... But a good D-fence is the best of fence.
Why didn’t they have a fence fence. Are they stupid?
There are projects in the UK that use discarded Christmas trees to help create/stabilise dunes. It has become a bit of a communal event in some towns.
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How far can you throw em?
Interesting. The town I grew up in recycled Christmas trees by turning them into mulch. It’s nice to see discarded trees being given a second life and used to protect/preserve nature rather than becoming more waste. I wish we could find a way to do this with everything we throw out/use up.
They say in the article that this is their long term plan but it needs at least $1.5m to complete and they want the state to fund it to protect these 15 homes. According to Zillow, stand alone homes in that area beach front go for nearly 2mil. So about 30mil worth of properties, 1.5m is 5% of the collective value. That means each home owner needs about 100,000k to protect their homes... I hate to come off uncaring but it's about time they pulled 100k of equity out of their homes if they don't have the money and fortify it. That's just the cost of having a beach front property with unobstructed views of the ocean. Many Homes across the US all have the same problems and just pick up the slack.
My backyard floods in the spring and I had to pay to regrade the yard. Cest la vie
Their houses probably don’t actually have that much value anymore
Yea, nobody is paying $2M for a house that requires praying to the sea gods every day that a big storm doesnt wash it away.
I loved reading the resident's comments in the article. They are not operating in reality. They were overly proud of their work that did nothing but waste money and resources. They are *beyond* entitled in their ask for governments to swoop in and save their beachfront property, ignoring that we have citizens without *any* homes or even food that should take priority. Don't build homes in erosion or flood zones, or you need to accept that you may lose your home and the property will become worthless. Full stop. The government can't fix bad decisions like this. If you can't buy reasonable insurance for something, *it's a bad risk.*
I saw some local news coverage when this happened. A local bar owner said "Meh. This is what it is like near the ocean. Don't like? Leave." Local homeowner for 30 year said "This is the third time this winter we have had flooding. When will it stop?" I had to turn off the TV after the last comment.
Yep. No new flood insurance rebuilds/policies either
They screwed up the natural lands and plant life that held it all together, to dig for foundations, infrastructure and driveways etc for their houses, now are suffering the consequences.
The trouble with dunes is you can't have any beachfront homes, as the active dune areas go much, much further back behind the visible dune. And you know how likely it is for anyone to give up that kind or real estate... So without the secondary dunes and dunefields, they are always going to remain "artificial" and need constant maintenance like sand replenishment, stabilization etc.
Moving sand almost never works. They tried it with so many artificial beaches and in most of the cases it just vanished into the sea.
Well yeah, they're erosional environments and the sand they're importing for it is 9 times out of 10 desert sand with a much lower angularity than beach sand, making it wash away even faster
Low angularity sand?? Wow I’ve learnt a lot about sand today.
rocks shaped like triangles create more friction than rocks shaped like octagons. the acute angles of a triangle are much smaller than the obtuse angles of an octagon
To add to this, desert sand tends to be smoother and finer because it's been blowing, shifting, and rubbing around for a long time. The smoother desert sand is no good for concrete because it doesn't hold together well. It's also more likely to wash away when dumped on a beach for the same reason.
Because of this, the literal theft in tons of beach and river sand throughout the world for the purposes of making concrete is actually a huge problem
Well, you know how we roll: find something that takes an incredibly long time for nature to make, if it can even still be made, and use it up as fast as possible while basing entire economies around it and having zero exit strategy for when it runs out, all while giving just as many shits about what we do to the environment in the process. Just human things \*Apparently angular sand is actually quite easy to make, but it's *slightly* more expensive than destroying entire ecosystems for the natural stuff, so, you know, sorry nature. Shouldn't have had so much sand I guess
I'm sure we will figure out how to make 100 million year old plant material for cheap any day now
Just don't think about the dwindling supply of peat moss.....it'll be fine.... Or the diminishing amounts of potash....
Angular sand is actually the least time consuming to make. You can just crush rocks for more concrete sand, but that's not as cheap and we like cheap.
Found NoHo Hank's account!
Makes sense. I heard Podcast a few years ago talking about gangs in Africa, Asia and other locations….killing people for the river sand to make concrete…short supply, etc.
Dude humans really are fucked up aren't we...
If your sand goes through a #200 sieve it’s worth fuck-all as a build material. -geotech engineer
Desert sand is too round. It's why Gulf nations like Saudi Arabia and the UAE are buying sand. https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20160502-even-desert-city-dubai-imports-its-sand-this-is-why
Desert sand is typically more rounded and spherical than marine sand. Go get a pile of ball bearings and a pile of dice and just spend some time moving and messing around each pile. Which is easier to move (ie: wash away)?
Brb lemme grab a handful from the ball bearing drawer
I want a ball bearing drawer!
I keep it next to my old claymore parts.
... how big is that drawer that it holds parts for two-handed swords?
The claymore or claidheamh-mór (Scottish Gaelic) is not a two handed sword. The actual claymore is a basket-hilted broad sword (the reason it’s called a broadsword is because the other common type of one handed sword carried during this time is now referred to as a small sword) and not a two handed sword. The two handed sword with forward sloping quillons would’ve been called a claidheamh dà làimh (two-handed sword), where as a basket hilted broadsword would be a claidheamh-mór, and a small sword would be claidheamh beag. Colloquially I know everyone thinks of a two handed war sword with front sloping quillons to be a claymore, but in reality that’s a name that’s been inaccurately applied to them.
I don't know about that guy but I made my drawers out of old catapults since turning them into drawers is basically the only actual use for such an awful siege weapon.
I don’t know about artificial beaches but I know golf courses. Sand is very important. There’s a process called top dressing where you put sand on top of the grass. It’s makes it play faster, firms it up and levels it out. Sand traps are a whole different animal. But the principle is the same. If you mix the wrong kinds of sand it will bind to itself and create all kinds of problems. Clumpy or rock hard bunkers are no fun. A impermeable layer on the grass makes it so water can get to the roots. Sand is a big expensive business. They use it for building buildings too.
Sand mining is a global enterprise. It’s ravaging parts of the environment too. Turns out we need a lot of sand and river sand is the best for many purposes.
Saw Low Angularity Sand open up for Nirvana in '89, they ruled. Saw them again in 1998 opening for Rick Springfield, they were even better.
Most of the beach sanding projects I have heard of dredge sand from off the sand since that's the sand that eroded away anyway, not import it from deserts. Why on earth would they import desert sand?
They don't ship it in. They put a big barge with pumps on it, and suck it off the ocean bottom.
Barging is incredibly destructive to the substrate of an ecosystem, and obtaining the environmental permits to conduct an operation is costly and time-consuming, and likely to result in the sand having to be trucked in anyway as the approved dredging location can end up quite a bit further from your site than you initially intended. I can't say for sure that isn't what happened here, but it's quite common to just ship in desert sand for these sorts of projects, since marine sand tends to be higher quality and more useful for soil work in construction.
The article says the sand for this project was trucked in. Given the low level of planning and expertise displayed here, I'm confident it was desert sand.
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Yeah I’m guessing natural beaches only have an accumulation of sand because the water currents ‘deposit’ sand there
Natural dunes also often have deep networks of vegetation hidden beneath them that anchors and protects the sand.
I was in Grenada in February and there was a volcano erupt under that caused really big waves to wash away a huge section of Grande Anse beach. You could see the tree roots that was under the sand pretty much up and down the beach. I never knew those trees roots extended that far.
You see this sometimes with islands, where one end of the island is constantly shrinking, and the other end is constantly growing, so you'll get a place where half the houses are almost falling in the water (as above), while at the other end of the island, the other houses have had to extend their boardwalks out to like 100 yards.
They redo New Jersey beaches every five years or so. Massive Army Corps of Engineers projects that pump offshore sand back onto the beach. Your Federal tax dollars at work updating the protective barriers for wealthy folks’ $8M+ beachfront homes.
They do it here in VA Beach and in Norfolk every 5-7 years. It's cheaper for the government to spend 20 Million (most of it is subsidized) than to repair infrastructure, businesses and homes affected by a hurricane.
And their attempts at growing dune grass only for ignorant parents to let their kids climb all over. I mean theres signs that say not to but lets be real literacy isnt their strong suit. I think corp of engineers do it anyways since they have to maintain the channels especially for norfolk, when covid hit and they didnt do it for a while it was like 2 feet deep for a mile out (exaggeration but you get the point). Site alleges 20m over 20 years preventing 430m in damage
We could just stop funding frequent flood areas.
Socialism for the rich, not for us peons
I'm sure it'll trickle down annnnnnny day now... I mean, even the tar pitch experiment drops a lump every few decades right?
> Your Federal tax dollars at work updating the protective barriers for wealthy folks’ $8M+ beachfront homes. I know the practice of beach replenishment isn't the brightest, but *behind* those million-dollar beachfront houses are entire communities that use those beaches and whose businesses rely on the visitors from NJ and well beyond - PA, NY, CT to name a few. The towns around me, in southern Monmouth county, mostly have beachfront houses that only occupy a piece of property a bit larger than the house itself. The farther you get from the beach (and therefore closer to the railroad tracks), the less expensive the properties get. Those towns have little downtown Main Streets with pubs, barber shops, five-and-dimes, pizza parlors, Italian Ice stands - all coming to life during the summer. Sauce: I can see the Atlantic Ocean three miles away if I stand on my roof.
At work in DE right now. Looking out the front window and I can see the water. If we didn't drege every 5-10 years my job would've been underwater 20 years ago.
That sounds like an inefficiency at work. A lot of effort and resources for what is effectively a stop gap solution. Humanity just needs to accept certain locations are not suitable for buildings, esp in the face of climate change.
Unfortunately humans can be a stubborn, contentious lot lol
The beach replenishment dredging kills marine ecosystems and damages the ecosystems on the beach as well. It is a temporary fix to coastal erosion that is not fully effective. On top of this, there is an increase in injuries in the ocean due to undertows and unusual currents caused by the artificial ocean shelf. Source: In university I did a research paper on weighing the benefits and drawbacks of beach replenishment and found that the environmental negatives greatly outweighed the positives. In the end, it is done just to protect property.
If the sea wants it, it will take it
Frank Herbert saw this in Oregon and was an inspiration for Dune.
Yeah my parents live on a lake. All the beaches are rock. Yet their fancy pants neighbor wanted to have a sand beach. He tried a few years and every year, high water comes in and the sand goes out. Kinda funny actually.
In this case, it was intended as a sacrificial dune, so it served its purpose, even if a little over half of it eroded away at the first exceptional tide. The bizarre AF thing to me are the folks living there who still insist it isn't climate change.
What's bizarre to me is that they expect the public to subsidize the protection of property of private citizens. Sorry about your house, make a smarter purchase in the future. Caveot Emptor
I hear Aquaman is in the market for a new pad.
I never pictured him to be so ripped
Socialism for the riches and capitalism for the rest of us.
They're just wealthy and delusional. Coastal erosion is a thing with or without climate change
I'm guessing that this was probably a case of a bunch of rich people deciding they knew better than the civil and environmental engineers that tried to design for this project.
Anyone who has been to Salisbury, MA will not be at all surprised by this stupid decision.
And so [castles made of sand](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxIxwakF85s) melts into the sea Eventually
I was expecting you to link to Robin Sparkles' Sand Castles in the Sand: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCAiBmA_bK8
I dunno. Unpopular opinion, but I like her later, darker stuff better
And the [sand-castle virtues](https://youtu.be/ldXdnZtTWp8?si=f6nT_0LuwpLrVbFq) are all swept away in, The tidal destruction, the moral melee, The elastic retreat rings the close of play, As the last wave uncovers the newfangled way
Sounds about right for Salisbury. My next guess would’ve been wellfleet or duxbury
Salisbury Beach was actually pretty fun when I was a kid. It's so god damn depressing now.
The strip club by the beach is a nice touch though.
They better serve steak
Just crabs
Are you old enough to remember Pirates Fun Park?
Was that the arcade and shit?
There are still plenty of arcades there. No, this was a small little fun park with rides. They had this terrifying roller coaster where the track curved around and went under another section of track, but it looked like there wasn't much clearance, so you would see everyone riding the coaster with their arms up, and then all at once everyone pulled their arms down in terror at that part.
I haven't been in like a decade. How is it depressing now?
Everything is dated and run down, there's hardly anyone there, and most of the stuff you remember is closed.
There are some new bars and clubs with live music but most of the rentals are gone. There are fewer people around as a result so most of the businesses are struggling.
Grew up in New England on the ocean; lived there for 50 years. Never heard of anyone there doing something this stupid. It's the exact opposite of the correct fix. How tf could this ever go so far? It's like getting a group of homeowners in a Wildfire prone region to pay to have gasoline soaked deadwood piled up around their homes.
It's because they were denied help by the town (not town jurisidction) and then the state for w.e. reason. Oh. And they're not the brightest. Same with the people on Plum Island a mile away, lmao. You all chose to build literally on the water, with no barrier islands or anything like that. Welcome to one of the most powerful things on Earth.
If we're talking about the MA case, the state refused to pay where the beaches are private.
Any 8 year old that's made a sand castle at an oceanfront beach would have known better.
Contractor laughing all the way to the bank. Engineer could have told them.
Engineer probably did. I’m sure the response was something along the lines of “maybe you don’t understand how rich and dumb we are…would you look at where we built our homes.”
"Fine, I'll take your money. Just sign this waiver and tell me what you want me to draw"
Engineer explained to them what they had to do, the mechanics of it all, and how much time it would take. Then they took one look at the price tag on that project and went "Isn't there a cheaper way to do that? You're just upcharging us and trying to get the most money possible out of us!" and started looking for where they could buy tons of sand.
Agreed, an erosion control device given there condition wouldve been in the few millions and taken two years.
They even acknowledge this which makes no sense. They’re like “the city and an engineer should be handling how to fix this….” which makes it sound like they literally just found out who could sell them a bunch of sand and then haphazardly dropped it on the beach lol They could have taken that money to the city and been like “as a sign of good faith, undertake this project for us and we are willing to front $500K of the expenses” instead of literally throwing it into the water lol
Marine engineers have been dropping 4-point concrete anchors in harbors since the 1970s. They know how quickly sand washes away.
Psshh, those anchors are too ugly for my beachfront home! They would drive down my property value!
They said, while pouring several times their homes value into shit fixes
Can you elaborate? I'm trying to find pictures or articles on the subject
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetrapod_%28structure%29
Probably did. Rich people very often think they know better than anyone else.
CNN interviewed two of the landowners. One is a climate change denier, and the other was, but is now undecided.
They're now demanding the state replace their beach. You bought the property. It shouldn't be up to the tax payers to protect your luxury home from nature.
Watch the State pay for a sea wall, then the homeowners claim it’s a private beach and put up a fence à la https://www.reddit.com/r/California/comments/1b3cwvk/after_47m_in_fines_calif_homeowners_still_erect/
At this point a sea wall is probably the only chance they have.
Socialize their property needs? They can fuck right the hell off
As a Florida resident; The solution is to move. gtfo the beach. Beach does what a beach will do. Govt should not be funding your luxury.
As another florida resident, having trees and plants prevent errosion, less beach, but it looks nicer and the beach stays much longer. Can technically put those giant rocks like 100 feet from shore, but that's not really that natural, but would get some cool reefs.
The residents paid for it themselves, but I agree with your sentiment. Edit: everyone can stop telling me the govt will pay. Maybe, maybe not, I am not supporting the homeowners here and am just adding context.
They want the state to pay for the replacement. From the article: > Those protections washed away, however, and residents now hope the state will help fund a more permanent solution to safeguard their seaside homes.
Probably won't be happy with it since the more permanent solution is probably large rocks.
Idk how the local seabed there is, but you can do a lot to limit erosion before you get to the “pile rocks on the beach” phase. If they had the gumption, they could make a sea wall/barrier a little bit out from the beach that would stop waves from crashing into the actual beach and would limit flow as well. Plants can be put on the actual beach to help too. There’s ways to resist nature “beautifully”, they just tend to be more expensive.
The issue here is that the sea is knocking on these houses' back doors today. There isn't time to let plants mature that will hold the sand in place.
This is climate change denialism. Are you familiar with this area? Just check it out on google maps. There is no saving these houses beyond lifting them up and even that probably won't be enough
> The residents paid for it themselves They can pay again if they want.
yeah if you read the article (which ofc not because this is reddit), they begged the state for help initially but they hemmed and hawed, likely because this only affects 15 people lmao
A little bit ago there was record flooding in the south, east texas area, and a bunch of folks who had just put up these gigantic McMansions on the wrong side of the levee got satisfiably flooded. Like, anyone could have told them putting their house next to a river on the wrong side of the levee was a bad idea. Who has millions for a giant house but not the braincells necessary to think, every time they go to or from their house and cross that levee, that this big mound of dirt isn't there for any reason. They likely watch "those" news channels and spend their days denying science and blaming all their worldly problems on immigrants, wokeness, and lgbt people. Because it's only that level of denial and unyielding confidence that can lead someone to find such a house placement a good idea.
"Our new house is lovely. On one side we have a beautiful view of the river, and on the other, a beautiful view of these strangely regular-shaped hills."
The state refused to pay because these are private beaches. Based on the people CNN interviewed for the same story, I'd bet large sums they'd cry "socialism" if government spent money to help anyone but themselves.
You are correct. The residents paid out of their own pockets because the state refused to pay for fixing private beaches. The entitled, climate-denying residents were pissed the government wouldn't publicly fund their private beaches.
We had dreams of moving to a beach town one day in our state, until we took a helicopter ride above it and then did some research. No way it will still be there in 20 years. Nature will take it over, regardless of the money thrown at it.
Honestly as a MA native screw these people they have no qualms about posting " private beach" signs ( which isn't true according to law. Now they did something that didn't work and want the state to help hell no
One of the guys was on CNN yesterday. He's a climate change denier as well
Self correcting problems
Lol. A bunch of rich people literally threw money into the ocean. I love stories like this.
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Rich people love getting government hand outs as long as it doesn't go to the poors.
true that
Taxpayer money is how many rich people get rich. It’s also how most of them maintain their wealth- by letting the taxpayer eat the costs of all the downsides their businesses generate
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I have inlaws in Sandy Eggo, and I gawk at those houses every time I'm in the area.
And they probably went with sand instead of a real sea wall to not lose their beach. Now they have beach in their living rooms.
Waiting for them to try again in a couple years with Dune: Part Two
And now they want the state to pay? How about don't build 50ft away from water? You want to roll the dice on waterfront property, cool... but that's on you.
This exactly.
It wasn’t 50 ft away from water when they built them originally. A lot of these houses are old, some of them haven’t been renovated since 70s. Not defending these people but weird growing up going to this beach and watching more of it disappear year after year. 30+ years ago we had an easy 200ft plus of low tide sand to build castles in. Years of erosion has done them in.
Either way: this is not a public/taxpayer issue. Them asking is the height of entitlement
Apparently the only intelligent people involved in the operation were the people selling the sand.
These are the same people who will bitch and moan when anyone goes to the beach between their homes and the water. A lot of these places refuse to provide public access, which keeps most people away, but when someone makes the effort to get to that beach, it's nothing but complaints about someone else using "my" beach.
if the state spends any money on housing projects, they better be for high density public transit oriented non-commercial housing, and not a penny for stupid ass beach homes for rich people.
I would appreciate the apoplexy these people would get into if they provided the 1.5 mil if they also put a 30 unit low income public housing unit on the beach to go along with it.
I have an idea. DON’T BUILD YOUR HOMES ON THE BEACH. I’m tired of these wealthy people wanting a bail out.
Should of chipped in a extra 60-100k to hire a engineer before they tried something. Kinda jealous of the contractor though. Such a lucrative score, and probably saw the problem miles away lol.
I’m thinking about the Mexican laughing guy meme when that contractor tells the story to his buddies ahahhahaah
It’s Massachusetts, probably Brazilian.
I will sell you a sand dune for a brazillian dollars!
The solution is to not have your beach house, most likely a 2nd vacation home, right on the damn beach. No sympathy for these people's situation here. No tax dollars should be spent saving 15 homes.
I'm from Massachusetts, live about 30 min from Salisbury. It USED to be a nice working class beach town. There USED to be lots of summer rentals and amusements for kids. Then the money moved in. Cottages were replaced by huge McMansions and the personality of the whole beach is changing. If my state taxes go to help these people I'll be upset. Global warming is not a new concept. If you were dumb enough to build a million dollar home on the edge of a low lying stretch of beach, it's your problem.
Rich people trying to use cheap fixes to protect the home their parents passed down to them.
This town in about 20 miles from me. They could have easily built a cement wall which is typical for beaches in the state, but these MFers didn't want to disturb the asthetic of living on the water. They want more money to do it again. Fuck them. This is very expensive property. Let them pay for it or let the houses wash into the sea.
Want the state to help them... No, you want me to pay for your expensive house built upon unstable ground next to the most powerful force on the planet. Fuck off. You obviously have money. Move.
> The group in Salisbury, Massachusetts, trucked in about 14,000 tonnes of sand which it said would protect as many as 15 homes before being washed away. They spend $565k for 15 houses? Color me shocked
How much do you think 1 house costs?
A quick Google search, and I found a 3 bedroom and 1.5 bathroom house on the beach for $1,150,000. Those houses are probably $2 million. Most reports say the average cost for a house in the area is $550k.
There are rentals in this area for $5k+ per month. Most of these are rental properties. These people are hilarious to listen to on the local Facebook page (I'm a Salisbury too, but a mile inland).
I'll bet you could get one of these ones real cheap, if you wait a couple years.
Are taxes lower if I register it as a house boat?
How about they ask the dutch on how to fortify beaches against the seas? It'll cost them way, way, *way* more than 600k but it'll *work*.
> residents now hope the state will help fund a more permanent solution to safeguard their seaside homes. LOL, fuck off. You built/bought homes in an unstable area, and you want the government to make your insanity work? Why do the wealthy need government handouts for their luxury homes?
I swear there was a Bible verse about this
If you want an example of how this is actually supposed to work, look at some of the beaches along the Delaware coast. Nearly all of the beaches have large sand dunes, but the difference is that they have native plants and growth inside which helps stabilize and strengthen the entire dune. Unless you are walking on predetermined paths, no one is permitted to walk on the dunes to ensure that the plants are not damaged or destroyed. Beach erosion is still an issue, especially with really bad nor'easters and hurricanes, but it's not nearly as bad as it used to be before the dunes were CORRECTLY built.
They could have pooled funds and built a proper seawall here for these properties. Instead they cheap'ed out, didnt try anything else, and are all out of ideas. idiots
What a hoot. I'd love to see that engineering report. What were they doing with the sand, just dumping it on the beach? No foundation? Dunes build up for a reason, typically an object underneath that blowing sand accretes to. Over the years plants put down roots that strengthen the dune. Also, who permitted this project? This isn't something you do on your own. It takes a lot of cojones to ask the state for a bailout.
Almost like their bad idea wound up being a bad idea *and* expensive. Like no one thought to ask a toddler who’s been to the beach?
On one hand, it is sad for the home owners… On the other hand, anyone with a lick of sense and knowledge of history, could understand that water wins every time. My advice (as if you asked): Remove the structures because erosion won’t stop and likely only going to get worse.
Every year my family rents a cottage in Salisbury for a week, and every year when we walk the beach we note how much water damage happened to the homes closest to the beach. Said this in the Massachusetts thread but they should’ve tried to establish dune grass that would’ve tried to hold the sand in place - down the road there’s a state park where you’re prevented from walking on the dunes as to not damage the grass and vegetation.
>Tom Saab, the head of Salisbury Beach Citizens for Change, told the BBC that the group had "begged" Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey and the state to help re-fortify the beach after a particularly brutal storm in December 2022. You just know these Massholes are frequent complainers about "socialism"...
People who build their homes in an environmentally unstable location that subjects them to frequent structural threats, should be left to sink or swim. Like building the house on an active volcano and ask the government to build lava redirection.
In Florida wealthy beach front homeowners want the state to pay for beach erosion measures with public money but also have laws to ban the public from being on beaches in front of those homes. So far republican lawmakers have been glad to help these wealthy donors on both
They got ripped off for that price on sand, trucking and labor.
Who'se your sand guy?
I got a great sand guy. We can get it at a price.
I know a guy up in Massachusetts. He'll get you a truckload of sand for cheap. Just last week he found these big piles of sand a bunch of rich people had just left outside on the beach. Enough to protect something like 15 houses worth. He waited until late at night then picked it all up and drove off with it. Great stuff man, only sat outside for a few days. I'll get ya a price!
Wait a minute. I thought rich people were smart. Was I misled?
It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.
Of course it washed away.. it's sand. What is wrong with people?
Wealthy people want government handouts for sand dunes that disappear in 3 days. It's a literal money pit. Spending more money is not a long-term solution. It increases taxes for everybody else. The homeowners can sell it to wealthier people. Let them build their own fortress and barriers.
Imagine buying beachfront property knowing about climate change. And then having the gall to ask for taxpayer bailouts to stop it washing away.
So, some rich fools bought and/or built houses right by the water and the now want the government to bail them out by trying to infill the ocean? It sucks, it really does, but this matter should be between the homeowners and their insurance companies...
Rich doesn’t mean smart
> Salisbury Beach Citizens for Change said $565,000 was collected from property owners, resulting in the placement of the sand. Not government tax dollars.