USACE Urges $30B Coastal Barrier System Along Texas Coast

The U.S Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has recommended its preferred method for protecting parts of the Texas Gulf Coast from storm surges and flooding…

The U.S Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has recommended its preferred method for protecting parts of the Texas Gulf Coast from storm surges and flooding. This course-of-action would provide a 78-mile long barrier system built along Galveston Island and inside Galveston Bay and the Bolivar Peninsula.

The estimated cost of building these barriers, gates and levees would run between $23 billion and $30 billion and would provide more protection to the oil and chemical facilities in that area.

The recommendation followed a three-year study by the USACE and is very similar to earlier proposals made by Texas A&M University in Galveston and the Gulf Coast Community Protection and Recovery District, a coalition of six counties organized following Hurricane Ike to study and recommend plans to protect the area from storm surges.

USACE officials recommended the construction of a 1,200-wide floating sector gate at Boliver Roads, located between Galveston Island and Boliver Peninsula and at the entrance to the Houston-Galveston Ship Channel.

The plan also calls for levees and floodwalls on Bolivar Peninsula and Galveston Island, including a ring levee around the east end of Galveston and barriers extending out to the west end as far as San Luis Pass.

Additional barriers would be placed near the Houston Ship Channel, Clear Creek, Dickinson Bayou, Offatts Bayou and Highland Bayou as well as nine restoration projects along the coast to increase resiliency and reduce flooding risks in coastal areas.

The plan stated that the proposed barrier would increase localized flooding after rainstorms near Offats Bayou, Dickinson Bayou, Clear Lake and the Intracoastal Waterway as well as alter or damage thousands of acres wetlands and bay habitats that could threaten breeding of juvenile fish, shellfish, manatees, sea turtles and dolphins.

The USACE doesn’t plan to issue a final feasibility study about the coastal barrier until 2021.

This story was originally published by Strategic Partnerships, Inc.