WAILUA — Christopher Kaplanis of Lihu‘e wrote in a Letter to the Editor, which printed Wednesday, “You can’t help but notice the sand disappearing at Wailua Beach.” The sand beach at Wailua Beach has been moving — tons of it
WAILUA — Christopher Kaplanis of Lihu‘e wrote in a Letter to the Editor, which printed Wednesday, “You can’t help but notice the sand disappearing at Wailua Beach.”
The sand beach at Wailua Beach has been moving — tons of it now relocated to the Aloha Beach Resort end — littered with vegetative debris and creating islets in Wailua River, which never existed before.
In June, Dr. Monty Downs of the Kaua‘i Lifeguards Association and the Ocean Safety Bureau, wrote about the disappearance of two Rescue Tube stations from Wailua Beach due to beach erosion.
These have since been replaced and relocated to a point closer to the highway.
“What once was one of Kaua‘i’s beautiful beaches simply is no more,” Downs said in his June 6 email.
John Patterson, in a Letter to the Editor dated July 11, states Wailua Beach is eroding at an alarming rate.
“Using Google Earth and historical imagery, I calculated that from 2003 until 2009, the average waterline was approximately 215 feet from the roadway,” Patterson says in his letter. “Imagery from 2010 shows this number had decreased to only 165 feet. And today at high tide, I estimate the water is less than 100 feet from the roadway.”
Patterson said the observations show more than half the beach has vanished in the past three years.
“If no action is taken this summer, a combination of wind, tides and swells certainly has the potential to send the ocean across the road,” he says.
Kurt Rutter of Kapa‘a, in a June 21 Letter to the Editor, points out “if Wailua Beach is eroding (and it is), then not only the path, but the highway and the Coco Palms property with sacred burials is also in danger.”
Kip Goodwin of Kapa‘a, in a June 20 Letter to the Editor, notes the high wash of the waves is less than 50 feet from the highway.
“Where the volleyball net and lifeguard tower were a year ago at the south end of Wailua Beach is now in the surf zone, and the plastic mesh underlayment installed under the parking area at the foot of the cane haul bridge is now exposed through the sand bluff created at the ‘high wash of the waves’ line,” Goodwin says in his letter.
He says the line currently determines the shoreline setback in the Shoreline Certification Process in the Kaua‘i County Code and consequently determines how near to the water, structures, even nonpermanent ones, can be located.
He cites Ordinance 887, passed in April, 2007, which established the setback at 40 feet plus, a formula based on erosion rate.
“A year from now, the entire beach could be restored, but in light of the evolving ordinance process and the guiding premise that retreat is the most effective means to shoreline preservation, placing the concrete multi-use path in this location would be foolish,” Goodwin states.
“The mayor and others pushing for the path on Wailua Beach should view this unforeseen development for what it is, accept the direction the Planning Department is headed on shoreline preservation and alter their agenda accordingly.”
James Alalem of Wailua and Ray Catania of Puhi, in a joint Letter to the Editor, June 13, notes the recent coastal surges, which “happened in late May and early June have now broken through the county’s own 40-foot shoreline setback ordinance.”
The pair observed, like Goodwin, the electrical box fronting the Kuamo‘o Road intersection at less than 19 feet from “the crumbling sand dune,” and the lifeguard base and former volleyball sand lot, along with boundary boulders from the makeshift parking lot, have fallen into the surge.
Ruby Pap, the Coastal Land Use Extension Agent for the University of Hawai‘i Sea Grant College Program, refers to a historical aerial photo used by the Geology Group to determine long term erosion rates for different areas of the coast.
Pap said, in a June email on the subject of the Wailua erosion, the goal of the Geology Group project is to measure long term trends in a consistent manner around the islands.
The map for the Wailua area can be found at http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/coasts/
kauaicounty/poster/Wailua_STposter_tmks.pdf.
“In the case of Wailua Beach, the long-term trend is accretion rather than erosion,” she said in the email dated June 24. Accretion means the beach has been growing over time. “However, shoreline position is highly variable or episodic, which means there have been extreme episodic erosion events followed by a return of the beach.”
She notes erosion has approached the road in the past (April 1975).
“The recent erosion, which is hopefully temporary, could be explained by the strong and consistent trades we’ve had recently,” she said. “The Northeast trade swell could have driven sand to the south toward the river mouth.”
She said this is an area that should be closely monitored to see if and when the beach comes back.
Dr. Chuck Blay, a geologist, naturalist and educator with TEOK Investigations, said in a June 22 email, “The situation at Wailua would have little to do with dredging of the river.”
Blay said the shoreline is changing and will change significantly over the next 100 years with probably as much as a meter of sea level rise.
The tendency will be for the beaches to retreat landward as the water level rises and if such retreat is blocked by shoreline development such as sea walls, revetments, harbor developments, etc., then the beach will erode with the sand going somewhere else.
