Sarasota News Leader

08/23/2013

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OPINION NATURE MUST TAKE ITS COURSE ON LIDO BEACH EDITORIAL For millennia, conventional wisdom has discouraged the building of one's structures upon the sand. Modern engineering techniques have made that proscription somewhat less axiomatic, but there is one reality that challenges even modern engineering: when the sand goes away … and it always does. that sand tends to come and go, historically we have figuratively buried our heads in that sand. How else could we explain our persistent — and, to date, futile — efforts to keep the forces of wind and tide in abeyance, denying to sand the mobility it has possessed since the dawn of time. Perhaps that is the basis for avoiding building The latest example of that sad futility is being on sand. It is entirely too transitory, especially played out on Lido Key, as the City of Sarasowhen structures are expected to remain for ta seeks permission to renourish the eroding centuries. southern end of Lido Beach by dredging botThe allure of the sea has long drawn us to the tom sand from adjacent Big Pass, and to build beach and, once there, we are further tempt- groins to protect the new sands from doing ed to remain. Hence the application of our what sands have always done. And the U.S. inventiveness to resolve the more immediate Army Corps of Engineers is undertaking an stability problems encountered when building exhaustive study to determine if it will allow upon the sand. As for the longer-term concern the project to move forward.

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