Engineering and design of the Lightning Point Shoreline Restoration Project in Bayou La Batre, Alabama

Abstract

Lightning Point, located in Alabama at the confluence of the Bayou La Batre navigation channel and Mississippi Sound, is a culturally and ecologically valuable site with an extensive history of shoreline erosion. Between 1916 and 2019, the shoreline experienced approximately 750 to 1,000 ft of shoreline retreat as a result of severe weather events and anthropogenic causes such as shoreline modification and response efforts related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Moffatt & Nichol worked with The Nature Conservancy to restore the lost habitat and resources through ecology-based engineering and design. The Lightning Point Shoreline Restoration Project is a 1-milelong living shoreline that includes approximately 4,700 ft of segmented, overlapping breakwaters, 40 acres of marsh and upland habitat creation, and 10,000 linear feet of tidal creeks. The project was designed to include a diversity of habitat types (subtidal, intertidal, higher scrub-shrub) and to serve as a resilient restoration solution capable of adapting in the face of sea level rise and increasing storm activity.