FORT GRATIOT

County plans work to stabilize Fort Gratiot beach

Jackie Smith
Times Herald
Area resident Kathy Flood and her son Kyle, 12, hunt for rocks on Monday, July 10, 2017, at Fort Gratiot County Park's beach. The county is moving forward with plans to stabilize the beach because of damage incurred from high water levels.

St. Clair County is moving forward with plans to limit further erosion of the beach at Fort Gratiot County Park.

“We’ve lost probably between 50 and 60 feet of the beach,” said Parks and Recreation Director Mark Brochu. “That’s pretty consistent down the shoreline.”

He said the sand along the beach has been washed away both because of current high water levels in Lake Huron and also because of unusual weather last year. 

On Monday, Brochu said the goal is to install five jetties “above the ordinary high-water mark to slow down the migration of the sand from the north or to the south.”

Last week, he told county commissioners a firm will engineer the project, bid out construction and administer that contract sometime this fall “to stabilize the soil.”

Twelve-year-old Lucy visited Fort Gratiot County Park's beach with her mother Shannon Vince and her siblings on Monday, July 10, 2017.

As of Sunday, Lake Huron’s water levels were about half a foot above the monthly average this time last year, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory.

According to a memo to board members, necessary permits from both the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality were received by the county within the last six months.

Engineering service proposals were solicited from two firms, and county officials are recommending a $22,340 bid from Project Control Engineering Inc., with a 10 percent contingency for a total not to exceed $24,574. Commissioners moved the item to the full board meeting this Thursday.

Because the actual work won’t occur until the fall, Brochu said beach-goers won’t notice anything particularly different.

And they might not notice any changes in beach depth either.

“That’s going to be a function of Mother Nature. What we’re going to do is prevent it from going further upland (or south),” Brochu said. “… People shouldn’t be expecting to get 40 or 50 (feet) of beach depth back. We’re trying to (prevent it) from affecting the buildings there.”

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Beach-goers were scarce at the county park on Monday.

Shannon Vince, originally from Marine City, was visiting from Texas with her kids Lucy, 12, Lucas, 9 and Oliver, 7. She sat with friend Holly Kaster, of Brown City, while they played on the beach with Kaster’s kids Mac, 9, and Grace, 13.

They had packed food for the day and tried to wait out the rain under the park’s beach-side shelter. None of them were too concerned about the impact of high water — only that the beach’s conditions were good for hunting rocks, which both said their kids love to do.

“I come to this park with my kids (because) my kids love the playground, and the beach is good for rock hunting for them,” Vince said. “It’s not too rocky, and it’s a smaller beach. There’s not a lot of people here. It’s a good opportunity to come and see a little bit of Michigan.”

Contact Jackie Smith at (810) 989-6270 or jssmith@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @Jackie20Smith.