News

Jun 13, 2023

Village officials give Rotary audience preview of broad resiliency project, noting: "The threat is real; inaction is not an option."

Dr. Roland Samimy and Steve Williamson speaking to the Rotary audience about the resiliency project. You have to get up pretty early in the morning to keep up with Steve Williamson and Dr. Roland

Dr. Roland Samimy and Steve Williamson speaking to the Rotary audience about the resiliency project.

You have to get up pretty early in the morning to keep up with Steve Williamson and Dr. Roland Samimy.

Friday morning, members of the Rotary Club of Key Biscayne hosted the Village Manager and the Chief of Resiliency and Sustainability, who provided a sneak peek of the Resilient Infrastructure and Adaptation Program, to be officially unveiled April 6.

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"The lesson is, we need to prepare," said Williamson, who recently witnessed Fort Myers Beach almost totally destroyed by Hurricane Ian, except for the shell of a Margaritaville resort that was in the process of being constructed to state building code.

Trees knocked down in Key Biscayne during Hurricane Ian.

"We're never gonna stop nature, but we can mitigate it," he said.

Key Biscayne has some 15,000 residents and 1,000-plus businesses and professional licenses. Last weekend, Saturday saw 15,000 cars filtered into the Key and another 13,000 on Sunday, just part of the 7 million-plus visitors to the Village each year, Williamson noted.

"What are we really trying to protect?" Williamson asked, pointing to photos showing a vibrant economy and the perfect place to live and raise a family.

"Elevating our Island Paradise" is the theme for a long list of objectives that will solidify the Village from storm surge, flooding and sea level rise, at least for 20 to 30 years.

"It moves the ball down the field," Dr. Samimy said. "This is one of the biggest, if not the most important, things Key Biscayne will be doing in its history."

Looking at the long-range plan, intensive work will be done in each of six zones to cause minimal disruptions. Things like upgrading the stormwater system, putting utilities underground and installing LED lights – done at the same time by digging just once – will save time and money.

Meanwhile, projects will go on to handle immediate issues, such as flooding in the K-8 School Basin. Immediate issues are critical, since the scope of the entire project, including the shoreline plan, is estimated to perhaps be completed in 10 to 15 years.

Vulnerabilities in the Village include: a low-lying island, unprotected shorelines, an aging stormwater system and exposed infrastructure.

"We can control vulnerabilities," Dr. Samimy said. The key is not to combine vulnerabilities with "real" risks, he said, such as rainfall-induced flooding, sea level rise, storm surge and coastal erosion, to name a few.

Williamson said his Village leadership team – including Dr. Samimy, Public Works Director Jake Ozyman, Village Planner Jeremy Calleros Gauger and Capital Improvement Projects leader Colleen Blank – will be supplemented by "an extension of our staff who are going to help us work through this the next 15 years ... They have done work like this across the country and the world."

The strategy is to commit to the accustomed way of life on the island, minimize disruptions, preserve the environment, include the residents in all communication, and maximize the investment from outside sources.

As far as protecting the 1.2 miles of oceanfront, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will likely go through with its plan of an enlarged and reinforced dune system.

"The first line of defense (against waves) is a reef, which we don't have one here, but we could create an artificial reef, maybe," Dr. Samimy said. "The second line of defense is the beach (17,000 cubic yards were lost this past year to hurricanes Ian and Nicole), and the next line of defense is the dune (the concept being basically a wall under the sand with a concrete cap, not just north-south, but with two tieback walls all the way to Crandon Boulevard)."

Shoring up the 6.9 miles of Biscayne Bay starts with a three-year Back Bay Study by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, approved this past week, and will coincide with Miami-Dade County's comprehensive study of shoreline protection and recommendations.

A render of Miami's proposed seawall.

Two other areas also will need to be included: the Northwest Village boundary (.4 miles) with the County, and the Southwest Village boundary (.6 miles) with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.

One questioner in the audience during Friday’s presentation asked if Key Biscayne was going to be patterned after another city in particular.

"Every community is not like a cookbook," Dr. Samimy said. "California, New York, South Florida and here in Miami Beach, for example, they all bring a collective knowledge ... (and they) bring the best and brightest to the table."

In fact, he said, architecture students from LSU came to the island last week "to see what we are doing," Dr. Samimy said, "so it's a constant back and forth."

Williamson noted that cities such as Galveston, Charleston and Miami Beach could certainly be looked at "as to what they did well and what they didn't" and he gave an example of how the Dutch, who started back in the 1500's, protected their land from surrounding water.

Miami Beach and a team of scientists and engineers from the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science and the College of Engineering just recently deployed two artificial reefs offshore North Shore Oceanside Park to kick off a two-year project to test coastal resilience strategies.

Studies have shown that shallow coral reefs can buffer up to 97% of the energy from waves.

One of the concrete reefs off Collins Avenue is hollow with limestone boulders on the outer surface to mimic the texture of coral reefs and attract marine life, while the other is perforated to allow water to flow through. Each is 19 feet long and about 6 feet tall.

On Key Biscayne, Dr. Samimy said, "We're not starting from scratch. We've been building up to this moment the last handful of years."

Steve Williamson speaking to the Rotary audience about the resiliency project.

Some accomplishments that have begun, or are in development, include: analyzing the existing conditions to prioritize improvements; completing a LIDAR survey to measure elevations "on a centimeter scale;" designing the K-8 School stormwater basin upgrade plan (that will be replicated throughout the Village); and, working with the US Army Corps of Engineers on a Beach and Back Bay Feasibility Study.

Other accomplishments include: making sure Florida Power & Light has a design plan for electrical undergrounding; crafting a Joint Power Agreement with Miami-Dade's Water and Sewer Department; creating a seawall ordinance; developing streetscape design standards; and executing immediate flood control and mitigation projects.

A community meeting will take place April 6 for the unveiling of the Resilient Infrastructure and Adaptation Program, and to discuss the "30% design plan," such as Harbor Park. Details of the meeting will be forthcoming.

Meanwhile, the race is on to mitigate flooding problems that could occur, as a graphic was displayed showing a 2050 sea level projection.

"The threat is real," Dr. Samimy said. "Inaction is not an option."

The Rotary Club of Key Biscayne meets at 7:30 a.m. every Friday in the community room by the Turtle Fountains on Village Hall. For more information, visit rotaryclubofkeybiscayne.org or email [email protected]