COASTAL OBSERVER

A low spot on Pawleys Island is due to rise under a project that the town expects to be the first of many to reduce flooding and improve drainage.

Work could start before the town completes a stormwater master plan, due this summer from the engineering firm SeamonWhiteside.

“This is an effort to show a little proof of concept,” Mayor Brian Henry said.

The state provided the town with $250,000 for drainage improvements in 2023. The project will use up most, if not all, of that.

What the engineers have proposed is a 2.5-foot-high berm along the creek side of Myrtle Avenue north and south of the Pawleys Island Chapel. It’s an area where extreme high tides send water over the street even on sunny days.

Rhyne Phillips, the project manager for SeamonWhiteside, told Town Council last month that the average high tide in the creek was only about 6 inches lower than the pavement on that stretch of Myrtle Avenue based on 2023 data.

Not only does water flow over the road, but it flows through pipes that are intended to drain into the creek.

The vegetated berm would tie in with higher ground at each end, Henry said.

“I understand the logic of this,” Council Member Rocky Holliday said at the council meeting last week. “I really wonder if we’re thinking big enough.”

He worked on a couple of pilot projects around Town Hall that used check valves to prevent the tide in the creek from backing up onto the island through drain pipes.

“If we break it into chunks like this, we’re not going to solve the problem with flooding on the island for years and years,” Holliday said.

“We’re not looking at this as a piecemeal action,” Henry told him.

The town is due to get $2 million for drainage improvements from a capital project sales tax that Georgetown County voters approved last year. 

The work is 10th on a list of 22 priority projects, giving the town time to design actual projects that will use the funding, and possibly grants that the sales tax can match.

The drainage study by SeamonWhiteside began last year with a state infrastructure grant. It follows a plan commissioned by the town in 2022 to address sea level rise. The final report from the engineers will provide a priority list of projects that the town can complete with sales tax revenue.

“This is more of a let’s-get-something-done,” Henry said of berm.

The cost for design and obtaining permits for the berm is $44,500. SeamonWhiteside estimated the construction cost at $171,000 “with a fair amount of contingencies,” Administrator Dan Newquist said that could take the total to $240,000.

“So basically $280,000 for that 900-foot stretch,” Holliday said. “That doesn’t seem to horrible to me.”

If it fixes a perennial hotspot for flooding, it will be money well spent, he added.

Council Member Ashley Carter said that doing the work in front of the chapel will make it more visible and help sell the concept.

Council Member Guerry Green asked if the berm will require placing fill in the marsh.

The proposal from SeamonWhiteside doesn’t envision working in the “critical area” that falls under the state’s jurisdiction, but that will be confirmed in the design process, Newquist said. 

That will also determine whether the work is in the road right of way or on private property, he added.

He said he would get additional information for the council, which expects to vote on the project next month.

“This might be a way for us to see how it works and clear some hurdles,” Henry said. “And it shows some progress.”