Delaware Beaches Can Go Pound Sand
After watching their beaches wiped out by the Great Nor’Easter of 2009 and wanting the State of Delaware to pay for beach replenishment, Rehoboth Beach now wants to pump treat wastewater into the ocean reports The News Journal.
Each summer, the weekend population of Rehoboth Beach swells from 1,495 to 20,000, most drawn to the city’s reputation for soft sand and clean water. Delaware typically scores high marks on ocean water quality from national environmental organizations and rarely are there advisories against swimming at any of the state’s resort communities.
Sure, go ahead with this stoopid plan, and I for one will campaign relentlessly that the Delaware Beaches not get one dime for beach replenishment.
Tags: Delaware Beaches
The problem with Delaware beaches has always been their inability to think long term and to overlook the reason people visit them, which is the beach!
It always seems to be about making or saving a quick buck, and it always seems to be at the expense of their only asset. As a summer resident I have attended more than my fair share of council meetings. The disconnect is quite startling. For years they allowed and encouraged over-development (and ugly over-development, to boot) and now are shocked – shocked, I tell you – with all the flooding.
Pumping wastewater is a disastrous PR move for an area that relies on tourism to survive. And it’s no surprise that this idea is being floated during the emptiest beach months. That’s always been standard operating procedure for these towns.
It really depends on the quality of the water treatment and how far off the coast they pump it.
what’s “treat wastewater” mr grammar?
It’s wastewater that you can give to kids on Halloween, fool. 🙂
And that’s “Mr. Grammar” to you or maybe “mr grmmr”
How bout the Delaware River and its dredging! Are you all not paying attention to your back yard?
Rehoboth should require visitors to carry their waste out with them. This really is a non-issue, Ocean City, Bethany, Myrtle Beach have been doing this for years and those beaches are nicer than Rehoboth’s. Plus this debate has been going on for as long as I have lived here. As Cooper said, the alternative is not any more appealing.
The funny thing is all our resort towns already pipe storm water runoff right off shore in the swimming areas and have since Jesus invented beaches.
I think it is 6000 feet off of the coast. Over a mile. From what I understand that this is a common discharge method, another being debated was farm usage discharge… in other words having it sprayed on an open field for re-introduction into the ground water supply.
Delmar Dustpan has a bit on the topic. He is on Delmar’s Utility Commission, and knows a bit about the topic.
http://delmardustpan.blogspot.com/2010/01/rehoboth-and-its-sewage-discharge.html
There are lots of questions about how fisheries are affected by some of these ocean outfalls. But it all does depend upon how aggressively wastewater is treated and there’s plenty of stuff in wasterwater that is not treated. Like the pharmaceuticals that people flush down the toilet.
That said, I think that if the city was required to do an agressive water monitoring program, routine (and frequent) inspections of the pipeline AND required to acknowledge that if something screws up here they cannot rely on State funds to clean it up, it doesn’t seem much of a problem to me.