The GMC coastal team (formerly South Coast Engineers) serves as the lead coastal engineers on this ambitious living shoreline project in Pensacola Bay, which is currently under construction.
The project, funded through the RESTORE Act, was led by Escambia County in close partnership with Naval Air Station Pensacola. Nearly 70% of the three-mile-long living shoreline project is adjacent to NAS property. This project will not only replace and protect critical estuarine habitats, it will also provide recreational opportunities for the public and improve force protection along the NAS fence line, which in this case is an exclusion zone in Pensacola Bay.
To learn more about the project: A Living Shoreline in Pensacola Creates Jobs and Protects People and Wildlife | Audubon
This unique living shoreline project spans across three very different sites, with each representing its own significant design constraints. The largest design constraint by far was addressing the bird air strike concerns of NAS Pensacola. Each of the three sites are under flight approaches to the base. Mitigating the potential for bird air strike was a driving factor in most of the final design decisions.
This project, currently under construction, is demonstrating success in sediment management, sometimes referred to as the beneficial use of dredge material (BUDM). All of the sediment needed to build the project elements is coming from existing resources nearby. Almost all of the sand needed for two of the project sites is being excavated from a USACE dredge disposal area within a few hundred feet of the southernmost site. Sand for the third project area is being recovered from the surrounding water bottoms, which have experienced significant shoaling due to the progressive collapse of a peninsula that had been cut off from its historic supply of sediment.
GMC is one of the most comprehensive multi-disciplined architecture and engineering firms in the Southeast.
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