BRADENTON BEACH – A snorkeling trail is one of the potential improvements planned at Coquina Beach, commissioners from Manatee County and the Town of Longboat Key learned Wednesday.
Other items targeted for enhancements are the jetty at the south end of Coquina Beach in Longboat Pass and 20 erosion control groins on Coquina Beach, Tom Pierro, an engineer with Manatee County’s beach engineering firm, told commissioners in a joint meeting at the Manatee County Administration Building in Bradenton on Dec. 1.
A recreational snorkeling trail built with limestone boulders close to shore off Coquina Beach would cover a half-acre and become a popular destination, said Pierro, with Coastal Protection Engineering, which is developing the project for approval by county officials. A 2-acre artificial reef farther offshore but not intended for snorkeling is in the planning stages to meet mitigation standards required by a beach renourishment project permit, he said.
Also on the drawing board is a plan to shore up the iconic jetty at the southernmost end of the Island, which was built in the 1950s and is deteriorating, Pierro said. In 2012, geotextile tubes were installed to make it more impermeable, but they have outlived their usefulness, he said, with sand being eroded from Coquina Beach and flowing through the jetty into Longboat Pass.
Further north on Coquina Beach, 20 groins built in 1959 to stabilize the beach need replacement, he said. At the south end of the beach, they’re buried in the sand, but at the north end, they’re exposed, creating a safety hazard. Engineers are assessing the feasibility of replacing them with three breakwaters, each 300 feet long, placed about 300 feet from shore in the Gulf, Pierro said.
The good news is that “Anna Maria Island is full of sand right now” after beach renourishment projects were completed last year and this year, he said.
In 2020, sand from Passage Key off the north end of the Island was used to renourish the beach. This year, sand from Longboat Pass off the south end of the Island was used, which saved money because the pass was simultaneously dredged, Pierro said. The 2021 project was completed in 20 days in February and March, enlarging the beach from Fourth Street South to Longboat Pass where it had been eroded by Hurricanes Hermine and Irma.
Beach renourishment began on the Island in 1992, he said; since then, more than 6.8 million cubic yards of sand have been laid on AMI beaches.
