Living Shorelines in Action: Havre de Grace

CCLC invites you to join us for a Field Day on June 4, 2026 that will focus on the Living Shoreline in Havre de Grace, MD. The tour will be led by Naomi Wright, Manager of Construction Services for the City of Havre de Grace.

Havre de Grace is a beautiful city located at the mouth of the Susquehanna River on the northern tip of the Chesapeake Bay. The Susquehanna is one of 150 rivers that flow into the Chesapeake Bay! The city has a wonderful river walk and a charming downtown area. Standing on the shoreline, looking out over the Susquehanna Flats at the Living Shoreline project, it’s easy to see why the green shoreline with plants swaying in the breeze is welcoming to both people and wildlife alike!

For more than 5 years, the city has been working to address flooding and erosion along Water Street. Increased flooding from storms and sea level rise threatens existing infrastructure and public health within the city’s drinking water intakes only a few hundred feet downstream from the project site. The Living Shoreline project was constructed in 3 phases. The National Wildlife Federation (NWF), with the City of Havre de Grace and their contractors, led the effort to replace failing bulkheads with a cost-effective and innovative nature-based solution. With the support from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the living shoreline project resulted in the transformation from an industrial bulkhead to a natural shoreline complete with beach habitat, tidal and non-tidal wetlands, dunes and meadow grasses. This flagship project is a model that NWF will use in other vulnerable coastal communities in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.

The Havre de Grace Living Shoreline tour will be a wonderful way for us to tour a highly successful project.

1.5 CBLP CEUS