The Village of Pleasant Prairie was awarded $24,500 in grant funds from the Wisconsin Coastal Management Program. The funds will be used to develop a planning report that outlines findings, analyses, conclusions, and recommendations to restore Prairie Shores Beach into a conservation area.
The grant funding process began in June 2018 with a land survey evaluating erosion conditions along the Lake Michigan shoreline. The assessment was conducted by Clark Dietz Inc., which provided maps identifying what parcels have good, fair, or inadequate erosion protection. The information from the evaluation helped Pleasant Prairie seek the grant funds needed to design and develop wave mitigation methods that can reduce wave energy to protect against public shoreline erosion.
Erosion is a natural process, and Lake Michigan’s shoreline continually changes shape. Waves eat away at the lakeshore and cause havoc along the southeastern Wisconsin Lake Michigan shoreline. The lake is at near-record high levels, and waves frequently attack the coastline resulting in the Kenosha Sand Dunes within Chiwaukee Prairie losing an estimated 80 feet of shoreline due to erosion in the last several years.
The $24,500 grant will provide the Village with a shoreline restoration plan that includes preliminary engineering to stabilize the dunes and enhance existing natural features. In addition, the research will contain habitat restoration plans for re-vegetation in the shoreline area to re-establish native flora. It will also include engineering focusing on shoreline protection to prevent further erosion from rising lake levels.
With the help of grant funding, the Village plans to install offshore submerged breakwaters or stills that will trip waves earlier, lower wave energy, and protect the public coastline from future erosion. This project focuses on conserving public lake frontage and is still early in the planning, research, and design stages; protection efforts that develop the wave tripping methods will not begin until later.