Shell Island Newspaper Articles

Reprinted by permission of The News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina

July 22, 1999

The News & Observer

Nature's victory

Page: A14

The prospect that their investments in coastal resort property might one day tumble into the Atlantic must be frightening for the owners of condominiums in the nine-story Shell Island resort on the tip of Wrightsville Beach. Indeed, though a decision from the N.C. Court of Appeals upholding the state's ban on sea walls is the prudent one, there is no joy for anyone in the possible fate of the resort.

But the sea wall ban, which was in effect at the time the Shell Island resort was built, is a farsighted law designed to protect the whole of North Carolina's coastline. Were property owners to prevail, the likelihood is that more risky development along the coast would be encouraged. And sea walls, while they may protect specific pieces of property, lead to other erosion and can change a coast line.

The resort's property owners do plan to request this week a two-year extension on a permit from the state Coastal Resources Commission that has allowed a temporary line of sandbags to protect their property from the shifting Mason Inlet.

If all the sandbags accomplish is to buy time for the owners to continue their court fights, that request should be denied; an extension might be more reasonable if it's linked just to the continuing efforts to relocate the inlet northward, back to where it used to be. But then any relocation might affect nearby Figure Eight Island, and the whys and wherefores of that idea could prompt a heated dispute. It's not exactly a day on the beach.

Even before Hurricane Fran, many coastal property owners had learned harsh lessons about the futility of trying to stem or redirect the ocean's tide. Shell Island developers were forewarned, as others have been who've built in fragile coastal areas determined to enjoy the pleasures of seaside living. That may be a tempting lure, but it also is a dangerous one.

Many North Carolina beach property owners have been forced, through the years, to move their houses or face the prospect of deciding what to do about their beach property from a list of limited and not very attractive options.

It's sad that Shell Island's investors will suffer here, that people who dreamed of a "place at the beach" could see that dream end abruptly. But the state cannot allow laws designed to protect North Carolina's valuable and finite coastline to be weakened. It must stand behind those laws in court.

The threat to Shell Island is a shame for those individual property owners; but it's also is a lesson to everyone who entertains a notion that the ocean is somehow willing to negotiate on anything besides its own terms.

Section: Editorial/Opinion
Edition: Final
Estimated Printed Pages: 2

Index Terms:
Shell Island Resort
NC
coast
judicial
decision
EDITORIAL

Article Type: EDITORIAL

Copyright 1999 by The News & Observer Pub. Co.

Record Number: 1999202037