Big, ugly and disruptive. That’s how a young couple described their discovery of the new outfall pipe at Vendome Ave. The structure interrupted their daily walk along the Margate surf.
We love to walk with feet splashing in the surf, from one end of Margate to the other. Today, was the first time ever, we couldn’t do that so easily.
That big nasty pipe was in the way.
We needed to walk up and around the pipe, just to continue our walk. It literally splits the beach in two, along the surf line.
The first of 5 Margate beach outfall pipes has been installed at Vendome, just a few blocks north of Lucy.
In other beach news, the Margate Beach Patrol HQ has been raised. The guards may suffer from a few nose bleeds from this height. But… they’ll now be able to see over the new, 14 ft dunes that blocked their view of bathers in front of Lucy.
New drains and sewers at the Margate street ends are being installed.
These ‘inlets’ will feed storm water into a network of piping just beneath the sand, along the bulkhead. Water will ultimately flow into one of the 5 new outfall pipes.
Outfall pipes take street water directly into the surf.
Sometimes, the storm water run-off is contaminated by a variety of materials like animal droppings, automobile oil, detergents, fertilizers, cleaning fluids and other materials. For years, this water would typically work it’s way to the beach where it would percolate/filter and safely drain into the sand.
When the new dune system was installed, large pools of water would be trapped. Sizable ponds would form between the dune and the bulkhead. (Lake Christie)
Margate was boxed in. The city had little choice but to accept a multi-million dollar drainage project to fix a problem that was clearly caused by the Army Corp of Engineers.
As you may have heard, beach work will continue thru mid-June. Maybe longer, if you know anything about Army Corp of Engineers [ACOE] & Dept of Environmental Protection’s lame track record of keeping to a schedule.
Homeowners ask why beach work stops on the weekend. Wouldn’t the project get done faster if crews worked 7 days a week? Weekends off now, means more of Margate’s prime time summer is disrupted.
Disrespectful. Total disregard for business that depends on an already short summer season. Vacationers are also given the one finger salute by this poorly planned / executed project.
Work will continue well past Memorial day. Our guess is the ACOE will work straight up til the 4th of July weekend, because that’s how they roll.
Calling Assemblyman Mazzeo, Senator Brown, Congressman LoBiondo…… little help over here?
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Maybe Gov. Christie should be out there defending this beach project on T.V. before he gives any comments about other people’s wrong judgment. And, maybe the judge on this case should be brought down to the beach to see the mess she created. The actually ruined a beautiful part of the country.
There just aren’t enough words to describe this atrocity and now animal droppings in the ocean, just can’t get any better!
I prayed all winter for 3 giant Northeasters to take out these dunes but then forgot our Commissioners signed a 50 year agreement to replenish the dunes. The most beautiful part of Margate was her beaches, now we just have Burger trucks, miniature golf, and ugly pipes along our beaches.