SANDWICH – Town officials in Sandwich are contemplating what their next steps will be in the reconstruction of Town Neck Beach.
Coastal engineers were out on Town Neck Beach recently to evaluate how much sand may have been lost from the re-nourishment project during last weekend’s winter storm.
Crews had just finished putting 120,000 cubic yards of sand on the eroded beach the week before the storm.
A sharp drop-off from the newly built dune was visible along the entire stretch of the newly-placed sand, but officials said it could have been a lot worse if the new sand wasn’t in place.
The re-nourishment project, which called for dredged sand from the Cape Cod Canal to be placed onto Town Neck Beach, cost the town around $3 million.
Those funds included state and local money, as well as funding from the Community Preservation Fund.
Selectman Susan James said she is interested in hearing from the taxpayers on what to do with the beach going forward.
“The taxpayers paid all this money and I’m assuming that the taxpayers have a real interest in preserving their investment and I would like to hear from the people who paid for it,” said James.
Selectmen Chair Frank Pannorfi said that they intended to use the sand temporarily until a more permanent solution could be found for Town Neck Beach.
“This project, albeit $3 million, with the hopes of getting 182,000 cubic yards of sand was going to help but it wasn’t the final answer,” said Pannorfi. “This was kind of an interim move on our part. We were hoping to get five to seven years.”
Sandwich is currently in the process of trying to acquire 300,000 more cubic yards of sand from Scusset Beach on the other side of the Cape Cod Canal to do additional beach nourishment.
By JUSTIN SAUNDERS, CapeCod.com Newscenter
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