King tide creeps in as Delray Beach seawall project inches closer to completion

DELRAY BEACH, Fla. — The king tide is wreaking havoc once again in low lying areas across South Florida.

Some people are even taking on water in their homes.

But it’s nothing new for those who live on Marine Way, a street with an Intracoastal view in Delray Beach.

WPTV has filed countless stories over the years on the issues residents there deal with every year.

While there’s a light at the end of the tunnel and a massive city project underway, there are still a few issues to sort through.

A war against water

Clair Johnson has watched the same story play out on his street during every king tide for 31 years.

“It used to be three to four months, now it’s four to five months every year,” he said.

Some of his neighbors have called it quits and moved. Others have stayed behind and built up their homes to prevent water from seeping through.

This week, the water is back once again and Johnson took on water in the entryway of his beautiful blue multi-story home.

“The reason we’re having it today is because of the big storm that’s out in the middle of the Atlantic pushing all the waves onto our beaches which is pushing water inland, so it’s much higher this week than it was supposed to be,” he said.

Over the years, Johnson has invested money into raising his home and sandbagging before every flood.

Just recently, he took it a step further and tried building his own sandbag seawall, spending about $7,500 on it.

“I got the permission from the Army Corps of Engineers just to put sandbags on the street but the city has decided that they own the street and that I didn’t have the right to do that,” he said.

So his sandbags were removed and disposed before the next big tides, much to his frustration.

“Everything that FEMA told me to do to protect the water from coming across the street, I had done.”

With a seawall project in the works and getting closer to completion, Johnson is hopeful a seawall can be done as soon as possible with jeopardizing his home, his docks and the vegetation in the neighborhood.

“I’m not mad at the city. I just want them to have the street be the walkway and let me or them put a wall along here,” he said.

An end in sight

It’s taken years in the making but the city is continuing their project to build a seawall along the area.

“We finished the north end, which is our veterans park seawall,” said Delray Beach Mayor Shelly Petrolia.

The next phase further south at the city marina is in progress, which includes both a seawall and a boardwalk in the approved plans.

“We’re talking about connectivity from veterans park all the way to the marina,” said Petrolia.

The city recently approved construction for the next phase — which is the area in between Veterans Park and the city marina around Johnson’s house — but the boardwalk was part of the plans that were approved.

And building the boardwalk comes at a cost, which neighbors are not happy about.

“First, I’ve owned this deck for 31 years, I pay taxes on it,” said Johnson. “I have my docks and my boat and all of this is part of my property value.”

The seawall is a welcome plan but the boardwalk poses concerns because of the risks in destroying precious vegetation in the area.

“All of the greenery is going to be gone. The birds that nest here, the turtles that are here. All of the environmental things that make this a beautiful walkway are gonna be destroyed,” said Johnson. “Save all of this beauty. We’re going to end up with boardwalk USA.”

But the mayor clarified that despite the approval by the city commissioners on moving forward with this phase of the project, nothing is final yet until the city discusses it further with the residents who actually live there.

“We’ve got to find that happy medium in order to be able to make the people living there happy and also those that are wanting to be able to utilize that boardwalk as kind of a riverfront of our town,” said Petrolia.

So that means the potential of building just a seawall and perhaps moving the pedestrian walkway in an area that wouldn’t disturb the vegetation.

“I also know that that section of road is not heavily traveled by traffic so if for some reason we can’t necessarily get a boardwalk in there, it may be OK to have the board end right there and maybe continue at the restaurant and move all the way down,” said Petrolia. “Because again, we’re not talking about a road that has any thru traffic so it’s more of just what works best for the city and for neighbors.”

This wave of king tide is expected to end this weekend.