State grant will help save shoreline at beloved Bellingham park

Bellingham ranks first on a list for a state grant that would cut in half the estimated $1 million cost of shoreline repairs at Boulevard Park, where recent intense storms and extreme high tides have caused severe erosion.

City officials announced Thursday, Sept. 23, that their $500,000 grant application topped an early list of funding projects released by the Washington State Recreation and Conservation Office.

Those grant awards are pending state budget approval, Bellingham officials said in a statement at the city’s website.

“This is great news for a project that has been needed for a long time,” said Nicole Oliver, director of the Parks and Recreation Department.

“These critical improvements are expected to increase shoreline access, improve habitat, repair damage and prevent further erosion at one of Bellingham’s most popular waterfront destinations,” Oliver said in the statement.

Oliver told the City Council’s Parks and Recreation Committee in March that strong waves over the past year have undermined a sidewalk and are threatening the popular South Bay Trail south of Woods Coffee.

Pounding waves also washed away part of a sandy beach at Pattle Point, near the walking trestle that extends from Taylor Dock.

Temporary fencing was installed earlier this year to keep people away from damaged parts of the trail.

“It’s quite alarming,” Oliver told the committee. “We’re experiencing some really significant high tides down at Boulevard and a lot of erosion. This area of the beach is just not protected,” she said.

Strong storms coupled with extremely high tides will continue threatening the Western Washington coastline, according to a NOAA report last month.

City Council members on March 28 unanimously authorized the grant application and agreed to use matching funds of $500,000 from the city’s Greenways levy.

Shoreline repairs were made from Woods Coffee north in 2013, creating a beach and adding rocks to protect the waterfront park, which is among the city’s “most loved” public spaces with its panoramic view of Bellingham Bay, Oliver said.

But there wasn’t enough money at the time to similarly protect the beach inland from the walking trestle, Oliver said.

Further work is planned along the waterfront north of Boulevard Park toward a planned new park at the south end of Cornwall Avenue as part of a separate project.

“Once we do this, the whole beach and the park will be protected,” Oliver said.