The living shoreline project at the Tides Inn, a historic resort in Irvington, VA, illuminates how thoughtful restoration efforts can rebuild local ecologies and natural systems for estuarine environments that have been degraded from development in the tidal creeks around the Chesapeake Bay.

The design reimagined the Inn’s relationship with the water’s edge, transforming approximately 1,300 linear feet of eroding and invasive plant-infested tidal creek margins into a stabilized, vibrant living shoreline with native species. The project also repositions 18,000 square feet of shoreline as the focus of guest/visitor experience and enrichment. Visitors are encouraged to observe and explore innovative shoreline reestablishment strategies along both upland walks overlooking the water and a quarter-mile curvilinear accessible wharf-walk that wraps around the rehabilitated waterfront edge. The wharf-walk allows for a variety of water-dependent recreational opportunities while also providing an immersive educational experience of this unique tidal creek landscape and ecology.

The project began with the client’s desire to address the significant loss of land due to erosion along the shoreline embankments – a recurring problem around the tidal creeks of the Chesapeake Bay. The team recommended a living shoreline approach to address the erosion and to replant the ecotone with native low and high marsh plantings. This was a departure from the more traditional use of bulkhead walls to prevent erosion and hold up the edge. Utilizing infrastructure as design, the wharf-walk provides an accessible structure under which a combination of rock, oyster beds, and low vinyl sills establish and hold the restored and replanted shoreline in place while maintaining the tidal fluctuations within the low marsh.

With the passing of new VA state regulations regarding living shorelines (2020), this project stands out as an example of how living shoreline projects can be established with historic structures along eroding estuarine perimeters. Given that a small fraction of Virginia’s waterfront is publicly owned, this puts the onus on private landowners to consider how to be good stewards of the Chesapeake Bay. As such, the project serves as a demonstration to those interested in alternative approaches to shoreline restoration. Different groups including upper watershed farmers have already visited the project to gain a better understanding of the process. With its growing popularity, a full-time staff ecologist has been hired to monitor and expand upon the habitat and to provide interpretive and educational information on the natural system.

The Tides Inn living shoreline restoration brings visitors to the water’s edge where education and guest programming are based on the unique beauty of estuaries and their role in the ecological health of threatened and delicate tidal creek landscapes. It sets a regional precedent for thoughtful investment in the future as the restored landscape will be better suited to withstand increasing tidal fluctuations, periodic flooding, and rising sea levels in the Carter’s Creek tidal community.

LOCATION:
Irvington, VA

CLIENT / PROJECT TEAM:
The Tides Inn
Gluckman Tang Architects - Architecture
Bay Design Group - Civil Engineering
Docks of the Bay - General Contractor
Earth Resources - Breakwater Contractor
Ruppert Landscape - Planting Contractor
Inaray - Lighting Design/Build Contractor
Friends of the Rappahannock + Environmental Concern - Non-Profit Partners

PHOTOGRAPHY:
Ansel Olson
Kate Thompson
RUUT

MEDIA / ADDITIONAL READING:
Metropolis Article