Government

Brick Marina Expansion Plan Can Now Move Forward After ‘Wet Floodproofing’ Approval

by
Daniel Nee
April 25, 2024

Safe Harbor Manasquan River Marina, Brick, N.J., Feb. 2023 Expansion Plans. (Credit: Daniel Nee/Planning Documents)

A proposal to make improvements to a popular marina in Brick Township was supported unanimously by township professionals and, ultimately, the planning board at its meeting Wednesday night.

Safe Harbor Manasquan River, formerly known as the Manasquan River Club, first proposed an indoor storage and repair facility at its site at 217 Riverside Drive, off Herbertsville Road in 2020, and made a few tweaks to the plan last year. The marina’s representatives returned to the planning board on Wednesday to seek a variance – with the recommendation of township officials – to use what is known as “wet floodproofing” to build the facility.

Due to FEMA-imposed flood regulations, the storage facility would normally either have to be raised to a height of 8 to 10 feet off the ground, like a home, or be built with a physical wall around the structure that is waterproof. Neither option was practical, nor safe, for such a facility, its owners said.

Raising the physical building would present the primary safety risk, said Michael B. Intile, the engineer and planner on the project.

“If you were to raise the building to flood elevation, you would have to raise it four feet,” Intile said, explaining that vehicles would have to traverse an approximately 40-foot ramp to enter. “It’s not a safe thing to be moving a Travelift up a 10 percent slope into the building.”

A Travelift is a motorized, four-wheeled vehicle that moves boats by slinging them in between pillars and dropping them at a new location. It is a specialized alternative to marine-grade forklifts that can be used to transport smaller boats.

“We’re a boating community, and I think we’re all familiar with what it looks like to see a boat being moved into a building,” said Township Engineer Elissa Commins. “I would think that asking them to dry-proof this structure would be infeasible to the point where it would be impossible to build the structure.”

Safe Harbor Manasquan River Marina, Brick, N.J., Feb. 2023 Expansion Plans. (Credit: Daniel Nee/Planning Documents)

The engineers and architects working for the marina came up with an alternative plan known as “wet floodproofing,” in which water is allowed to penetrate the first floor of the building without damaging it. In the case of a building where boats are stored on racks, water intrusion would not cause damage as it would to a traditional home or business.

Emmanuel Obiora, the plan’s architect, said the FEMA rules and township ordinances allow for wet floodproofing variances to be granted for marina facilities, with the exception of manufacturing plants.

“What we tried to do is use FEMA standards which use flood-proofing of buildings that does not do any damage to the structure itself,” said Obiora. “Everything below that flood-plain elevation needs to be flood-resistant construction, and that’s what we have.”

“Everything in the building can take the floods, and when the water recedes, there is no damage to the building,” he further explained. “It’s much easier to have the water move under the building than to have a free-standing structure up against the water.”

The board granted the variance unanimously.

The 2020 approval was granted after the marina appeared before the township’s planning board to seek permission to construct three new buildings that would have been used for boat storage, service and office space. The plan was later revised to condense the three buildings into a single building with an area of 30,150 square feet. A maintenance building would also be added to an existing 2,800 square foot structure. The marina itself is located on a sprawling 2.9-acre parcel that juts out into the Manasquan River west of the Route 70 bridge. It is especially popular with boaters seeking quick access to the Manasquan Inlet without having to traverse the notoriously slow-and-rough Point Pleasant Canal.

The marina currently houses a single-story masonry building with a large area for boat storage in the rear of the building and a large parking area toward the east end of the property. There is also a bath house and swimming pool on the premises.