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Hilton Head Island has been seeking public comment and preparing its permit application for work to repair the rapidly eroding section of beach at the heel of the island.
The town opened a 30-day comment period on the project Sept. 28 and has already held several meetings with the various state and federal regulatory agencies that have to sign of on the project, said Scott Liggett, director of Public Projects and Facilities for the town.
The project proposes dumping about 1 million cubic yards of sand along a 5,400-foot section of shoreline of Port Royal Plantation. To help keep the sand in place, the town also wants to construct a “leaky groin” at the northern tip of the heel on the Atlantic Ocean side. The groin will allow some water and sand to pass through, but the town says it will help stem the exodus of sand from the shoreline.
The project has been in the works for about three years after the town noticed that, following a long period of beach growth in the area up through 1999, the area had started eroding at the rapid rate of 60 to 130 feet a year. Residents complained the tide now comes in so far that people biking or walking around the heel of the island can be trapped on one side when high tide approaches.
Last year, town officials agreed the erosion was too serious to wait until the next island-wide beach renourishment, planned for somewhere between 2015 and 2017.
Liggett said the town hopes to start work in early 2011. The project is expected to cost about $11 million, but it has yet to be funded. Discussion of the project will be a major part of the deliberations over the town’s 2011 capital improvements program when the Town Council takes up the issue in the spring, he said.
