Manchester-by-the-Sea
Setting the Stage for Actions – Manchester-by-the-Sea
Manchester-by-the-Sea began a proactive approach to understanding its flooding risk and designing climate change adaptive strategies when it formed the Coastal Resilience Advisory Group in 2014. Barbara Warren for Salem Sound Coastwatch has been a member and involved in the Town’s climate planning. The Town evaluated town-wide flooding impacts on community assets under current and future climate conditions using extreme precipitation values coupled with projections of sea level rise and storm surge for 2025, 2050 and 2100. This information was incorporated into a climate-vulnerability assessment and specific adaptation projects for the Town’s 2018 FEMA Hazard Mitigation Plan and its MVP Community Resilience Building Workshops Summary of Findings. With climate priorities established, the town has followed up with grant funding and planning projects.
Current Coastal Resilience Projects:
Replacement of the Central Street Bridge and Sawmill Brook Central Pond Restoration
The Sawmill Brook watershed encompasses two-thirds of the town, including the densely populated downtown and harbor areas. Since 2011, the town has been working on understanding and improving flooding from the Sawmill Brook. With the knowledge that the Central Street bridge was classified by MA DOT as “severe/major deficiency,” the town studied the Central Street bridge/culvert widening and removal of the tide gate. Studies showed that this would address inland flooding and improve spawning habitat for migrating fish.
A $4.5 million Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) grant will pay for part of the cost of replacing and upgrading the existing Central Street bridge, as well as removal of an obsolete tide gate to further increase hydraulic capacity and promote fish passage.
Improvements will also restore fish passage and enable the town to ecologically restore wetlands to the stream reach at Central Pond.
CZM Coastal Resilience Grant FY23 Coastal Vulnerability Action Plan
Manchester is undertaking a major initiative to increase Manchester Harbor and the downtown resilience. The town has critical infrastructure at lower elevations that are currently threatened by extreme high tides and storm surge. Salem Sound Coastwatch is on the steering committee for this Coastal Vulnerability Action Plan that will develop a conceptual action plan to reduce coastal flood risks and increase coastal resilience at the neighborhood scale for the critical assets – Town Hall, Wastewater Treatment Plant, and the downtown commercial district. Building on past studies, the plan will provide a roadmap to reduce coastal flood risks and develop a phased approach to establishing action-oriented mitigation measures.
