Deal Lake finally scheduled for post-Sandy dredging

The Deal Lake Commission had pushed for the project to go another seven blocks further west to Asbury Park High School but that would have cost more than what was available in grant money.

ASBURY PARK -- New Jersey's largest coastal lake is getting some much-needed attention after Hurricane Sandy filled it with tons of sand, exacerbating the flood threat for nearby residents.

Deal Lake, which borders seven towns in Monmouth County, is scheduled for a major dredging project next month to remove 12,000 cubic yards of sand dumped there during the 2012 hurricane.

The state Department of Environmental Protection on Monday announced the project, which was welcome news to the head of the commission overseeing the 158-acre manmade body of water.

"This is wonderful news. It has been a long road back for Deal Lake from Superstorm Sandy," said Don Brockel, chairman of the Deal Lake Commission. "We hope this will be the first of many other dredging projects that can make Deal Lake more flood resilient and to fully restore it back to pre-Sandy conditions."

Brockel said the commission worked closely with the state DEP, the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service and Asbury Park to get the dredging money.

The state awarded a nearly $1.66 million contract to Tri-State Dredging of Philadelphia for the work. The NRCS, under the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is providing more than $1.5 million for the work from its Emergency Watershed Protection program and the DEP is kicking in $154,600, according DEP commissioner Bob Martin.

With 12.5 miles of shoreline, Deal Lake - which touches Allenhurst, Asbury Park, Deal, Interlaken, Loch Arbour, Neptune Township and Ocean Township - had flooding problems in the past, but those issues were worsened after Hurricane Sandy dumped tons of Sandy at its easternmost reach along the Shore, Brockel said.

Deal Lake (Google Earth) 

In some places, the lake is only 2 feet deep, which causes the waterway to overspill its banks in major storms, he said. The dredge project will deepen the lake to 4 feet between its oceanfront border in Asbury Park and Route 71, about three blocks, Brockel said.

The commission had pushed for the project to go another seven blocks further west to Asbury Park High School but that would have cost more than what was available in grant money, he said.

"We have problems going all the way back to Asbury Park High School," he said.

The commission is still looking for grant money to continue flood control efforts, including continued dredging, storm scepters and flume baffles.

Storm scepters would capture sand and sediment before it gets into the lake and would allow oils from runoff to be collected. While the flumes allow for the exchange of water between the ocean and the lake, a baffle system would prevent ocean water from backing up through the flumes into the lake during storms.

Dredging of the lake is expected to begin next month and will take about 90 days to complete under permits issued by the DEP and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The work was scheduled for the fall to avoid impacts on local roadways during the summer, Martin said.

Brockel said the dredged material initially will be put on land by the senior towers in Asbury Park a few days during the de-watering process. He did not know where the material would go from there.

Larry Hajna, a DEP spokesman, said the dredged material would eventually go to an approved offsite location that is permitted to receive the type of material that is dredged. 

He said the contractor can use an approved site of its choosing as long as it gets approved through the DEP's Office of Dredging and Sediment Technology.

Some work was done to the lake after Sandy to remove tons of debris, including splintered wood from docks, trees and mangled pieces of structures. The flume gatehouse has also been restored.

Carrie Lindig, New Jersey director of the Natural Resources Conservation Service, said the dredging of storm sediments from Deal Lake is the last of the 17 storm recovery projects funded by her agency in the state.