Group Wants to Tap the Ocean to Help Ecology of Linkhorn Bay

By JOHN WARREN

By John Warren

The Virginian-Pilot

VIRGINIA BEACH

Look at George Meredith in a room full of his well-heeled friends. Presiding over a pressed, tucked-in gathering, the 68-year- old retired physician is wearing work boots, unlaced, parachute pants and a “Hard Rock Cafe” polo shirt.

The lifelong outdoors enthusiast is passionate about environmental issues and is a prolific writer of letters to the editor, sometimes vitriolic. People have come to expect impassioned flourishes from George Meredith.

But this time, he’s really stepping out on the ledge. George Meredith wants to bring the ocean to his backyard.

He leads a group that’s had enough of the algae blooms and jellyfish that plague Linkhorn Bay. They want an infusion of what Meredith calls “nutrient-rich” Atlantic Ocean water.

A “re-infusion.” Four hundred years ago, historians say, a wide ocean inlet known as Stratens Creek fed water from the Atlantic into Crystal Lake, then on to Linkhorn Bay.

“This whole ecosystem here is based on clean Atlantic Ocean water coming in,” Meredith said. “All we have now is Chesapeake Bay water.”

On March 21, the effort officially took wings with the election of officers for the 100-member Linkhorn-Rudee Waterway Fund. Meredith, who drinks Cokes from a Mason jar, whose only vehicle is a 15-year-old pickup, is the president.

He lives in a sparsely furnished home in Linlier that was left to him by his parents. He describes himself as a fiscal casualty of his second divorce. His companions are two Labradors, Jake and Junior. He’s had 14 dogs named Jake; this is his fourth Junior.

Meredith grew up on Linkhorn Bay with his two brothers. He’s just old enough to remember the salad days for fishing in the bay, when you could fill a large crab pot in 45 minutes.

Meredith said he thinks the inlets that fed Linkhorn Bay began declining when a canal was carved to the Chesapeake Bay in 1640. That changed the “tidal hydraulics,” the way the water flows.

“Once you change that, these inlets started drying up,” he said. Among those affected, he said, were inlets some say were at 27th and 44th streets.

Then came railroad routes – to the Oceanfront in 1883, to Cape Henry in 1902 – further sealing inland waterways from the Atlantic.

The death knell, he said, was sounded with the Civilian Conservation Corps and its 1930s beach-sculpting efforts, then dragline dredging and bulkheading in the 1950s.

By re-establishing the Atlantic Ocean link, Meredith believes, marsh grasses will absorb water that now spills onto roadways; a marine nursery for shrimp and crabs would be created; mosquito larvae would perish courtesy of marsh-friendly killifish; and the table would be set for “fantastic fishing.”

The Linkhorn group proposes two ways to get it done. The better option, Meredith says, is to build six massive culverts along the 44th Street corridor, bringing the ocean to Linkhorn Bay (and, in turn, Broad Bay) via Crystal Lake and a widened Rainey Gut. The problem is all those $1 million to $15 million homes in the way.

John Malbon, onetime “King Neptune” and a member of the group, would prefer Meredith didn’t mention the 44th Street option. “I think that’s far from reality,” Malbon said. “Why even waste time?”

Phil Roehrs, the city’s coastal engineer, lets loose a whistle at the notion. “It’s not that it’s undoable, but … my goodness …”

The other option is more circuitous but less expensive. It involves linking one or more of the three branches of Owl Creek to a widened Great Neck Creek and through that to Linkhorn Bay.

“Going through Owl Creek, most of that channel already exists,” Roehrs said. Plus, he said, the Navy owns much of the land, which could simplify land purchase negotiations.

In fact, the Rudee-Linkhorn connection was explored by a group of Old Dominion University civil engineering students about 10 years ago. The premise of the study was that establishing tides through the new channel would flush out Rudee Inlet, negating the need for dredging.

“It’s amazing how close the upper reaches of the Rudee basin are to the Linkhorn basin,” said Dave Basco, who leads the coastal engineering center at ODU.

Roehrs sees at least one drawback. The conflicting high tides at the then-linked Rudee and Lynnhaven inlets, he said, could create a current that would erode banks.

“It is a large undertaking, and you’re talking about some significant environmental questions,” he said.

Something less than the Panama Canal, guessed Barry Frankenfield, design and development administrator for Virginia Beach Parks and Recreation. “You’re talking about significant issues with drainage, navigation, wildlife, elevations,” Frankenfield said. “Then there’s the cost.”

And so, Meredith and company first have to get City Hall on board.

A feasibility study would cost $500,000 to $1 million, Roehrs said. He said land would run $85,000 to $300,000 per acre.

It would mean obtaining many permits, with input from the Army Corps of Engineers, the Virginia Marine Resources Commission and the Department of Environmental Quality.

But how it can be done isn’t the first question, which is whether it should be done.

To that end, Meredith plans a petition to present to the City Council. He wants 30,000 signatures. “There are a lot of people in Virginia Beach who know this waterway is dead,” Meredith said. “Something logical needs to be done to restore it.”

John Warren, (757) 222-5114, john.warren@pilotonline.com

group’s plans

George Meredith and his group want to re-establish a link between the Atlantic Ocean and Linkhorn Bay in Virginia Beach.

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