Shore and Harbor Planning Grants

Orrington

The town of Orrington is designing a modern boat launch facility with parking and other recreational spaces like trails, picnic grounds, and bathrooms.

Orrington

The boat launch will be accessible at any tidal height and will be designed to accommodate future sea level rise over the next 50-100 years.

Orrington

Orrington’s existing boat launch is unusable at low tide and was not built for the current number of boaters in the area. Boating has become more popular, and both cars and boats are larger than they were when the facility was constructed in the 1970s. The current facility is crowded, too small for modern vehicles, lacks adequate parking, and does not have bathrooms or other public amenities.

Topsham

The town of Topsham is examining the feasibility of constructing a boat launch facility to allow public access to the lower Androscoggin River and Merrymeeting Bay. The town is also planning to construct a tidal monitoring station to measure sea level rise in the area.

Topsham completed its most recent Comprehensive Plan in 2019 and that process identified the need for public access to the river. Additionally, local emergency services would benefit from access via the Topsham side of the river.

Topsham

The Shore and Harbor Planning Grant funds are helping Topsham choose among potential boat launch sites near the town recreational fields and develop conceptual plans and estimates for future construction. This will help the town make concrete steps towards their goal of creating a public access site on the lower Androscoggin River. The town partnered with GEI Consultants for this project.

Monhegan Island Plantation

Monhegan Island is assessing its only public wharf, which was built in 1922, to identify needed short-term rehabilitation measures. The town is also trying to identify long-term opportunities for improvements that would sustain the wharf against the future impacts of climate change and sea-level rise.

The island community is heavily reliant on the wharf and its viability is essential for sustaining the community in the future.

Monhegan Island Plantation

Monhegan Island is using the funding from the Shore and Harbor Planning Grant to establish a plan for short- and long-term improvements to the wharf. This will help the town plan and prioritize funding for those improvements both now and in the future.

The project will engage the seasonal and year-round local community and will establish the baseline condition of the wharf, in addition to planning for future needs. The town partnered with GEI Consultants for the analysis, and also worked with the Lincoln County Regional Planning Commission and the Island Institute.

Falmouth

Falmouth is assessing the resilience of the town landing to understand its current status and plan for future infrastructure improvements. The landing provides a critical commercial and recreational access point to Casco Bay and town managers want to understand the impact of future sea level rise and flooding.

Falmouth

Maine’s largest mooring field is accessible from the landing and it is also used by public safety and emergency responders. The landing was constructed in 1999 but did not account for future sea level rise and the Harbor Master’s office, pier, boat ramp, and parking lot will likely be underwater in the future.

Falmouth

This project was designed to help town officials and local stakeholders develop a mitigation plan for the landing. This will include modeling to understand how often the landing will be flooded and unavailable in the future, a plan to alert people of closures, and an evaluation of damage from rising sea levels.

The plan will also recommend preventative measures and potential upgrades or replacements to help maintain the facility and prevent damage or loss from flooding events, as well as cost estimates for these efforts.

Ultimately, this process will create a roadmap for the town to plan for monitoring and future improvements to the landing facility. The town partnered with GEI Consultants for the project.

Belfast

Belfast is using the Shore and Harbor Planning Grant funds to complete an engineering assessment of the town breakwater. The City wants to understand the current condition of the breakwater and explore alternatives for renovating and expanding it to protect the city landing from sea level rise and storm surge.

The results of this project will be used to help the city compare and prioritize breakwater improvements. It will also be used to design the chosen improvements and help the city plan by estimating permitting and construction costs.

Belfast

The breakwater is necessary to protect the heavily used city landing. Belfast’s interest in this project stemmed in part from their participation in the Maine Coastal Program-sponsored Working Waterfront Resiliency Analysis [ Summary Report here ], which included the Belfast breakwater and landing.

The city is aware of the climate threats facing the breakwater and the landing and is investing in planning and resilience projects to support their infrastructure in the future. The town partnered with Wood Environment & Infrastructure Solutions, Inc for the engineering and design work.

Gouldsboro

Gouldsboro is using the Shore and Harbor Planning Grant funds to identify shoreline access points and establish formal methods for protecting them. The town is also identifying vulnerable coastal infrastructure and planning to prioritize investments that will protect the infrastructure from sea-level rise, storm surge, and increased storm runoff.

Gouldsboro

Gouldsboro is taking a holistic approach that will build community engagement and help community members learn what coastal infrastructure and activities, like shellfish harvesting, are at risk, and what can be done to protect and make them resilient in the future.

Gouldsboro

Rapid environmental and demographic change in the area emphasized the need for community engagement to highlight threats to coastal access. The town has few public access points, but the economy is highly dependent on marine resources, especially shellfishing and worming. Access is critical for these industries and is also valuable to other town residents. The project is focusing on ways to maintain existing access points as well as creating new ones.

Gouldsboro

The town also needs help prioritizing which infrastructure will need investment to maintain it in the face of climate change. Documenting existing info at a fine scale will be important, as will projecting and understanding future changes.