Six Years After Sandy, Development Of L.I. Oceanfront Real Estate Booms Right At The Water's Edge
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Following the sobering reality of Sandy’s aftermath, developers and homeowners who build on New York's coasts have adapted their efforts to the challenges of waterfront living, yet they have not slowed their pace. The questions are: Can they build to meet buyer demand while simultaneously anticipating the storm surges and shifting sands of the future? And can local jurisdictions balance the economic pull of housing development and local preventative storm-damage mitigation with the greater good? As with all land-use issues, the answer is murky, and in the past six years, local policymakers and builders have taken a variety of different approaches: In Island Park, a small village tucked away on a densely-populated islet on the south shore Nassau County (one of the two counties that comprise Long Island) Sandy hit particularly hard, leading to the damage of 95 percent of the community’s housing stock. Despite the known vulnerabilities of the area, Virginia-based AvalonBay Communities purchased an 11.6–acre waterfront parcel that was formerly used as a fuel oil terminal in 2017, and is looking to build 172 rental units right on the water. On Nassau’s north shore, along the famed gold coast in Great Neck, AvalonBay built 191 apartments on the waterfront of Manhasset Bay. As reported by Newsday, the developer raised both the structure and the utilities, in anticipation of future storms.
On the former site of a marina that was destroyed by Sandy, developer Beechwood Homes, is elevating a new condo project in East Rockaway, a waterfront village located just north of Island Park. They are mitigating against future events by adding enlarged drainage systems that will better absorb drenching rains and flooding, and newly constructed bulkheads that will harden the coast against increased erosion. Similar to AvalonBay’s measures, the builder is placing all mechanical equipment as high as possible. A Beechwood representative said that the firm has spent roughly $5 million to protect their project from storm impacts.
Many of these measures will only be truly tested when the next powerful storm strikes the northeast. The continued push to develop the waterfront isn’t surprising, especially with ample fiscal resources available post-Sandy. Developers often receive state funds to support storm prevention measures and thus must in theory, adhere to certain standards that consider the effect on the larger region. But in some municipalities, storm mitigation and coastal zone policies are not addressed in ways that transcend political jurisdictions.
In the small village of Nissequogue on the northern shores of Long Island’s other county, Suffolk, officials are allowing property owners to fortify their shorelines against erosion, possibly at the expense of other homeowners outside of the village. “There are hardening measures such as sea walls that if done on a property-by-property basis, will have major downstream consequences that make the problem even worse,” Lawrence Swanson, an interim dean of the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University, told Long Island Pulse in July 2018. “If we want to maintain the Island, we can’t make one part of that complex system static,” he said.
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https://www.citylab.com/perspective/2018/10/in-long-island-failure-to-absorb-sandys-lessons/573247/
