Creating an estuarine habitat in an area otherwise void of natural resources

Lake Pancoast Living Shoreline Stabilization

Lake Pancoast is a tidally influenced part of Biscayne Bay with no mangrove or estuarine habitat at the seawall. We were hired to design and permit the living shoreline system, which includes a mangrove planter, manatee ingress/egress points and a rip rap shoreline.

The permitting process was a huge effort as the area is within sensitive habitats, including Johnson's seagrass critical habitat and part of the Biscayne Bay Aquatic Preserve. We needed to obtain significant input from resource agencies, including Miami-Dade County Department of Environmental Resource Management (DERM), South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD), the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation (FFWCC). Our team held multiple meetings with these resource agencies and incorporated their input into our design.

Applying the team’s vast experience in South Florida’s estuarine and mangrove habitats, our final design produced a living shoreline and habitat for marine species, aiding in improving water quality within the area and directly benefitting Biscayne Bay.