I have just stumbled across an article about Smith Island, in Chesapeake Bay, which mentioned that it has two claims to fame. The first is that the inhabitants speak with a unique accent, and the second is that it will be eroded into nothingness over the next few years. However, I could find nothing to explain why, when your Founding Fathers set up the USA, they carefully drew a curved line to split the island between Maryland and Virginia, rather than the more obvious straight line which would have given the entire island to Maryland.
From this site, the zig-zags in the line there were due to some horse-trading between Virginia and Maryland about oyster beds in the area.
The original charters for colonies produced many boundary disputes. (See: Line, Mason & Dixon.) Smith Island was never much of an island, but, yeah oyster beds. Smith Island is a fascinating place, but I haven’t been there for a long time. You truly step out of the 20th (don’t even think about the 21st) century there. It’s old time America. It’s dying because it’s simply being washed away, as with so much more Chesapeake property. They apparently don’t have the will, or resources, or political clout to save the place. Last year, instead of going back through Smith, surveyed and mapped by one John Smith in the 1500s, we decided to land at Tangiers, not the casino, but the island a little south of Smith Island, even closer to the Atlantic’s surge. It’s a vibrant fishing community with enough sense to riprap the shoreline against the relentless wind and current. They’ll survive. But really, Smith Island is an American icon, worth visiting. For now.
Not if the water in their muddy soils rises to foundations and surface level, and their walls simply sink.
liquification.
Whats happening is that the entire bay is dropping down into the ocean, and the ocean level is rising too, and so … its all doomed… All the buidling of walls is self defeating, as the weight of the construction actually squashes the surface of the entire island in the area down… This is happening in areas where the ground water is static relative to bedrock (eg controlled by the bedrock of the valley.) In these areas, the buildings and roads are squashing the mud down , and so every thing is dropping. This is fine where the surface is well above ground water table… But at Smith Is, etc, the ground is barely above the ocean level… giving no margin for bedrock sinking. Pumping the ground water to keep the surface dry would also be self defeating as it would tend to remove sediments and reduce ground water level… The surface land is actually floating on that ground water soaked soil , any existant construction WILL sink , with the sinking bedrock, and will not rise with the seal level rises.
The wooden houses on the sandy beach strip may be easily lifted, but as the bay near the island drops, a storm can easily come along and take all the beach sand away… exposing the foundations made of mud…
If you ever find yourself in a fight against water, quit.
The water always wins.
Unless you can tie a structure into unchanging bedrock, the water will take it.
There is a 60 story condo tower in SF built on former marsh land.
Every other building in the area used bedrock pilings. This one went with cheaper, shorter pilings.
It is 301 Mission, and it is both sinking and tilting.
Local article on Smith Island doings.