Officials Optimistic North Beach Will Open For Holiday Weekend

by Alan Pollock

            CHATHAM — It’s what ORV users feared: with the Memorial Day weekend approaching, North Beach was closed to beach buggies and campers because of severe erosion and flooding.  But officials now say they’re optimistic the barrier beach will be open in time for the first rush of the season.

            On May 14, after several days of strong easterly winds, large surf and high tides, Orleans officials closed the beach to all ORV users except camp owners and licensees because of major flooding in the back trails.  The standing water hadn’t drained by Saturday, prompting officials to keep the beach closed through Tuesday. 

            Chatham Police Capt. John Cauble said he and Orleans Parks Superintendent Paul Fulcher planned to examine the beach conditions Wednesday.  Town officials were pumping out the standing water early this week and were optimistic that the trails would be passable.  Updated beach closure information will be posted on the town’s website.

            But even if the closure is lifted, ORV users will see a vastly changed beach this spring.  The tip of the beach has eroded north to the Kelley property, and the outer beach is still too narrow for ORVs to pass except for a small area near Road 3, which is in Orleans.  None of Chatham’s small stretch of remaining barrier beach is accessible by ORVs from the outside road, Cauble said.

            For people thinking of bringing ORVs to North Beach this weekend, the tide will be the determining factor.  There is just enough room for vehicles on the front beach, “but they can be there until the tide comes in and then they’ll have to leave,” Cauble said.  Normally by April or May, the outer beach has built up significantly, allowing ORV access at all tides.  That seasonal beach re-building has not happened yet, probably owing to the dynamics around the new inlet, experts say.

            The retreat of the outer beach is now more of a concern than the northward migration of the inlet, he noted.  The camps temporarily located on the Hammatt property are probably safe for this summer season, barring any new erosion, Cauble said.

            “And then, after that, maybe there’ll be some buildup.  If not, it’s going to be awfully fragile going into another stormy season or the next round of high tides,” he said.

            Of the four owners of camps evacuated from the First Village, some have privately expressed doubts about the viability of permanently locating them on the Hammatt property, despite the recent Town Meeting decision allowing them to do so.  The costs of putting a camp on pilings might reach $60,000, and comes with no guarantee that the buildings will be safe from erosion.  The camp owners then face the additional expense of demolishing the camps.

            The easterly storms that caused the beach to flood also wiped out all of the piping plover nests on North Beach.  There were no nests on Chatham’s stretch of the beach, and the one nest on North Beach Island survived the storm with a clutch of four eggs, Chatham Shorebird Monitor Kelly Hebert said Tuesday.  A number of plover nests remain on south-facing beaches in Chatham and Harwich, and there is a strong chance that plovers on North Beach will make new nests in the days ahead.  The re-nesting raises the likelihood that shorebird-related ORV closures will extend later into the summer season.

            North Beach Island is still strewn with wreckage from the winter, Hebert reported.  The town had planned to remove the debris—much of which came from demolished North Beach camps—but poor weather and logistical challenges have delayed that project.

            “We haven’t even had three days in a row when we could get over there,” she said.

            Hebert said she visited the beach with state zoologist Dr. Scott Melvin earlier this month, and Melvin was pleased with the town’s efforts to protect piping plovers and terns.  The town followed all of his suggestions except one: to place symbolic fencing at the tip of North Beach to try and encourage plovers to nest there.  Hebert said she consulted with town officials, “and we all agreed it would not be in anybody’s best interest to do that,” she said.  The town is happy to place symbolic fencing around existing nests, but to cordon off an area in the hopes of attracting birds doesn’t make sense, particularly since there is so much other plover habitat in town, Hebert said.

            Officials also worried about the practicality of fencing off the tip of the beach, which is always an important destination for many visitors.

            “It would be like trying to string off the Lighthouse Beach parking lot,” she said.

5/22/08