Plaquemines Parish (La.) President Keith Hinkley opened a GPS map on his cellphone as he veered off the road in Venice. He drove two miles on a sandy spit lined with freshly planted trees.
“Look at this,” he told a NOLA.com reporter. “Right now, it shows us in the middle of (Yellow Cotton) bay.”
The spot was open water surrounded by a disappearing marsh.
But after piping in two Superdome loads of Mississippi River sediment, the state Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority has created nearly 1,700 acres of freshly formed land extending six miles into the bay.
The new land replicates low natural ridges that once gave stability to much of Louisiana’s marshy coast.
Many of the ridges had eroded along with 2,000+ square miles of land in coastal parishes since the 1930s.
The ridge will help serve as a bulwark against erosion and storm surge for nine parishes, said Gov. John Bel Edwards, who was on hand for the May 12 ribbon-cutting for what’s known as the Spanish Pass project. The $100M project will wrap up in June.
The 2-mile-wide ridge will also provide habitat for wildlife. The Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program (BTNEP) provided nearly 47,000 live oaks, persimmons, honey locusts and other trees.
The trees will hold the ridge in place and help animals that have lost habitat. BTNEP selected trees that provide food and shelter for millions of migratory birds.
The sandy beach will draw people but won't likely be open to the public.
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