The North Shore Has A Complex Problem To Solve 

As usual, the North Shore of Oʻahu looks different than it did six months ago. 

Those who’ve witnessed the region in both summer and winter will notice stark differences along the coastline after the peak swell season. 

North Shore erosion is nothing new; what is new, especially in the last decade, is its influence on the region’s beachfront properties. Seventy-three percent of beaches are undergoing chronic erosion, with one-third of beachfront homes sitting within twenty feet of the shoreline. 

No crystal-clear guidelines and laws are in place, but that might soon change. I spoke with four individuals who were comfortable sharing their perspectives on the matter. They include:  

Doug Cole, former executive director of the North Shore Community Land Trust and son of big-wave pioneer Peter Cole 
Dolan Eversole, director of the University of Hawaiʻi Sea Grant College Program and part-time North Shore lifeguard of five years
Larry McElheny, co-founder of the Oʻahu Surfrider Chapter, public land advocate, and fifty-year North Shore resident
Chad Nelsen, CEO of Surfrider Foundation

All of their professional and/or personal experience was fundamental to my understanding of the current situation. My goal below is to unbiasedly present what I have learned.

Starting somewhere 

It’s essential to accept that the rate at which ice sheets are melting has accelerated due to increased overall ocean temperatures. Tide gauges indicate that there has been an average of about eight inches (twenty centimeters) of sea level rise over the past century. That rate is expected to increase exponentially if current trends continue.

“We are seeing slow sea level rise, but the problem is that it’s accelerating. It used to be a millimeter a year–now it’s three millimeters a year. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but instead of eight inches over the next hundred years, we are going to see three to six feet (ninety to one-hundred eighty cm) over the next hundred years,” Nelson said.

So, people are taking action. The North Shore Coastal Resilience Working Group was launched by the collaborative efforts of the Surfrider Foundation, Surfrider’s Oʻahu Chapter, the University of Hawaiʻi Sea Grant College, and consulting firm SSFM International. The group includes a broad group of stakeholders —including scientists, agencies in charge of enforcing development rules, and community members who are actively facing the challenges posed by erosion. 

Based on six meetings between 2021 and 2022, they identified a list of key issues and outlined potential solutions. The lack of options and transparent, publicly-shared guidelines for homeowners was considered the most pressing, apart from the erosion itself.

“We need to have a better policy in place that provides approved measures and draws a harder line between approved and [unapproved] protections. Right now, people do whatever they want, and there’s not much recourse,” Cole said.

Thinking big picture 

Without clear guidelines on how to protect their homes, residents are understandably taking matters into their own hands. Recent years have seen an influx of small-scale ‘coastal armoring’ efforts, including seawalls, tarps, sandbags, and sand pushing. 

Under bill SB69, proposed in February 2023, homeowners hope to win the right to use coastal armoring at their discretion across affected areas of the North Shore. The bill is a direct response to the counties increasing setbacks for shoreline constructions, which include seawalls and other temporary fixes. Although this approach can — at least in theory — protect private property, it can also deplete and damage the beach. 

“Public access to the coastline is guaranteed by law. In my mind, it should be guaranteed philosophically. It’s not fair for a bunch of wealthy, powerful people to block off access to natural resources that really should belong to everybody. I think the people that bought those properties down there took a risk; they’re obligated not to pollute the ocean and restrict beach access. They can’t just put a bunch of sand-filled, plastic burritos — those end up getting washed away, and the marine life ingests the plastic,” McElheny said.

Meanwhile, seawalls pose their own set of issues. 

“Say you put in a giant concrete wall that doesn’t move — what you will ultimately see is that the ocean is still rising, so the beach just gets pinched out. Over time you will end up with the ocean hitting the seawall, and there will be no beach,” Nelsen said.

Additionally, seawalls can leave unprotected areas on either side worse. If one landowner erects a seawall, the beach in front of their neighbor’s house might erode more quickly. This highlights the need for solutions that benefit entire neighborhoods, not just individual citizens.

Some say that coastal armoring — in the form of expansive concrete or lava rock walls — could be a more balanced, long-term fix.  

Problem solving

Adaptive Coastal Management Recommendations, Actions and Strategies is an in-depth report compiled by the NSCRWG. The group identified six recommendations for immediate action moving forward. With better-structured guidelines at the top of the list (mentioned above), a statewide managed retreat program came second. 

Using the North Shore as a pilot area, this project would provide a compensation pathway for affected landowners to voluntarily vacate affected properties and reinvigorate shoreline areas for public benefit. The practice would initially focus on the hardest-hit areas, and the key is to start the process before it is too late.

“One of the challenges that we are seeing at Kammies is that we’ve already blown through the normal triggers and timeframes that you would start to plan for [managed retreat]. We have accelerated to the point where it is critical now, and I don’t know that we have much more time before homes start falling in the ocean again. There is a sense of urgency here, […] and it’s kind of an example of what we might expect to see in other places shortly,” Eversole said.

Managed retreat can be an incredibly delicate subject. In some cases, you’re asking families to leave their multi-generational homes. However, the possibility of any monetary compensation for the property is preferable to its destruction.

“Your property might be worth millions of dollars, but if it’s about to fall in the ocean it becomes less valuable pretty quickly. Then you can’t get insurance. One of the other things we recommend is figuring out a buyout program. This would entail asking the state, or county, to buy the property or give the resident a lot somewhere else on the other side of the highway. You need to at least provide options for those who are willing to relocate,” Nelsen said.

Managed retreat may be an effective long-term option, but it needs to be part of a larger plan and requires feasible alternatives. The 2019 Office of Planning report recommended convening a “multi-prong statewide leadership committee” to “devise a comprehensive, cohesive managed retreat plan with identified implementable pilot projects at the end of its limited term.” 

Where are we going?

In an ideal world, private property owners, citizens, and local governments would all get along harmoniously — but we all know that’s rarely, if ever, the case. How do you get out of this jam in a way that’s empathetic and fair to all the groups involved? 

“The next phase for us is to try to use this initial study to instigate more action. If people are opposed to this, it’s important to communicate that because it’s part of the dialogue. The report also recognized that there wasn’t enough native Hawaiian communication. That’s work that we need to do. They have interests beyond just recreation; they have historical and cultural considerations that are essential to incorporate,” Nelsen said.

Because the North Shore is such a unique region, it is essential to develop a multi-faceted solution. What might benefit Kammies could be a hindrance to Mokulē‘ia, and vice-versa. 

“We should make a better effort to understand how dynamic this shoreline is and how much it varies from one area to another, because the solution in one section is going to be very different to a solution in another section. You can’t take a one-size-fits-all policy to the North Shore because different areas are at different levels of threat and impacted differently,” Cole said.

Surfrider Foundation — the Oʻahu Chapter in particular — is directly involved with this ongoing project. They bridge the gap between the surf community, scientists, and decision-makers. And they need the public to be engaged in these challenges. As new data comes in, policies should adapt. 

“We are in a data-rich environment and we are struggling to incorporate all this information into new plans and policies. That is where Surfrider and Sea Grant thrive – that arena at the intersection of science and application to policy. We always need more data, but we have enough to act on now. What we need is political will to start to implement policies that will help adapt our communities. There are some promising things that are starting to take effect here on Oʻahu at least, with new shoreline setbacks that are being proposed, and things like that will fully help to adapt our communities,” Eversole said.