Belfast expects almost $120,000 in storm damage repairs
BELFAST — The city of Belfast is expecting costly repairs after a storm that recently devastated the coast.
However, Belfast Mayor Eric Sanders remains confident in the city’s ability to deal with the issue.
“It was a big storm,” said Sanders. “We’ve seen them before, we’ll see them again, but we’ll make do.”
Belfast is still dealing with the fallout from a storm in late December that brought a different kind of winter weather.
According to city officials, the cost to repair city owned-property — including docks and boat houses — and clear debris from the powerful storm that hit on December 23, could cost as much as $120,000.
Belfast Fire Chief Patrick Richards says the significance of the damage is due to the city’s proximity to the ocean and a lack of an effective coastal defense.
“We sustained some very heavy winds, high winds, a lot of impact from the ocean, the sea level rise,” said Richards. “Anything that comes from the ocean we suffer quite a significant impact, there’s just no protection there.”
While a large portion of this debris was cleared before the start of the new year, many docks are still stacked up on nearby land, waiting to be repaired. Richards says this has impacted the fishing and boating community the most, but does not expect summer tourism to be affected.
Mayor Sanders says that the city has seen similar storm damage in the past, and that the town is planning to rebuild the current breakwater, which is meant to reduce the power of incoming waves before they reach the shore.
Sanders says that rebuilding the breakwater to be both taller and longer could cost an estimated $11 million.
“It’s gonna cost money, but it’s needed,” said Sanders. “In ’87 people said they were crazy to build it, that you’d never need it. I was down there on that morning, on the twenty-third and you couldn’t even see it.”
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