Waterfront Revitalization Program survey now open

The Town of Brookhaven has recently opened a South Shore Local Waterfront Revitalization Program (LWRP) survey.

According to the town, a major part of the LWRP is to propose projects that will make the community a better place to live, work and play. These projects are loosely grouped into five categories—water quality, living resources, public waterfront access, resilience, and educational partnerships—and when listed in the LWRP, promotes the town’s ability to secure grant funding.

According to NYS Department of State: “LWRP serves as the Office of Planning and Development’s primary program for working in partnership with waterfront communities across the state to address local and regional waterway issues, improve water quality and natural areas, guide development to areas with adequate infrastructure and services away from sensitive resources, promote public waterfront access, and provide for redevelopment of underutilized waterfronts.”

The Town of Brookhaven has begun the process of developing a LWRP and Harbor Management Plan for the South Shore, which includes 50 miles of Atlantic Ocean coastline. According to the town, LWRP will provide strategies and identify projects that improve public access, establish connections between downtown and the waterfront, modify local codes and ordinances to remove barriers to sustainable development, and incorporate sea-level rise projections and resiliency measures into community planning.

The town hopes to include improving and promoting public access and connections to the waterfront, promoting coastal resiliency and mitigating future impacts from flooding and rising sea levels, enhancing water quality and addressing related water quality issues, and reducing conflict between recreational and commercial users of the waterfront. The program also allows for a shared vision of the waterfront areas and to bring the community together to implement that shared vision.

Specifically in the Moriches area, according to town environmental analysist Alan Duckworth, the Local Waterfront Revitalization Program will improve the quality of life for and make the South Shore a better place to live, work, and play.

“The LWRP has many general goals, such as improving water quality, promoting waterfront access, increasing coastal resiliency to protect against coastal storms and flooding, improve educational partnerships, and make the South Shore a healthier place to live for residents and wildlife,” he said.

In the area, the LWRP also has specific goals and projects for each community, like developing green stormwater infrastructure for the road-ends of Atlantic and Ocean avenues and dredging the mouth of the Terrell River.

The proposed project’s questionnaire was released in April of this year after the last Waterfront Advisory Committee meeting was held in March.

For more general information, please visit the town’s website: https://www.brookhavenny.gov/1282/Local-Waterfront-Revitalization-Program? For more information about the program in generical visit the NYS Department of State website at: https://dos.ny.gov/local-waterfront-revitalization-program.