The resiliency of the built environment encounters its greatest challenges along the coastlines of the world. This conflict between the natural and built environments has been fought for decades along North Carolina's Outer Banks, a series of barrier islands along the state's coast. Parallel to the coast on a thin sliver of shifting sand is a stretch of North Carolina Highway 12 that runs from the Marc Basnight Bridge (formerly the Bonner Bridge) at the tip of the Oregon Inlet 72 mi south to the Ocracoke Inlet. South of the Oregon Inlet, the Atlantic Ocean can be seen over a short sand dune to the east, and the Pamlico Sound is visible to the west. Since 2010, the North Carolina Department of Transportation has spent an average of $6 million per year to monitor and maintain six "hot spots," or areas that were constructed to prevent high tides and repetitive storms from breaching the dunes. These breaches deposit tons of sand on the roadway and into the nearby wetlands of Pamlico Sound.
展开▼
