Help is available to New York’s Great Lakes property owners seeing damage to their shoreline as it washes away with the waves, wind, freeze-thaw, storm surge or flooding.

New York Sea Grant (NYSG) Coastal Processes and Hazards Specialists Roy L. Widrig and Kathleen M. Fallon, Ph.D. are available for virtual and in-person assistance.

The duo recently published “Erosion and Recession of New York’s Coastal Bluffs,” a guide to bluff formation, erosion processes acting on coastal bluffs, mass movements of bluffs and how to monitor and report bluff erosion. The guide includes an insert for tracking erosion on a property. The guide is free and downloadable at http://www.nyseagrant.org/theblufflet.

Widrig and Fallon apply their expertise to identify nature-based or structural ways to mitigate erosion that impacts shoreline habitat and encroaches on or affects the structural integrity of coastal properties. They also provide information on various state and local shoreline project permitting requirements. For more information, call New York Sea Grant at 315-312-3042. 

New York Sea Grant has additional guides on shoreline erosion mitigation and adaptation practices, planting native plant species that absorb and filter storm water and stabilize sand dunes, bio-engineering measures and installing break-walls and other hard structures.

New York Sea Grant is a cooperative program of the State University of New York and Cornell University. It is also part of a nationwide network of 34 university-based programs working with coastal communities through National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).