Sea Isle City moves forward on new stormwater pumping station

City Council awarded a construction contract Tuesday that represents the first phase of a stormwater pumping station to protect the flood-prone neighborhoods surrounding Sea Isle City’s new community recreation center.

The nearly $881,000 contract awarded to the low bidder, Fred M. Schiavone Construction Inc. of Malaga, N.J., is for the underground piping system along Central Avenue and 46th Street that will channel stormwater to the pumping station.

Sea Isle is expected to award another contract in September for construction of the pumping station itself. City Business Administrator George Savastano estimated the entire cost of the project at between $2 million and $3 million once all of the contracts are awarded.

The pumping station will protect the area from Park Road to Landis Avenue between 43rd and 47th streets, all the way to the bay.

It will be built next to the city’s new $21 million community recreation center, which is scheduled to open in the fall between Park Road and Central Avenue from 45th to 46th streets.

“As everyone knows, flood mitigation is one of the priorities of our capital improvement program, and this project will address an area prone to chronic flooding,” Mayor Leonard Desiderio told City Council.

    The city's first stormwater pumping station, largely hidden underground, helps to protect a flood-prone area at the bay end of 38th Street.
  

Pumping stations intercept floodwater and channel it back into the bay much faster than it would normally take to drain off the streets after a coastal storm. They have proved effective in Ocean City, Avalon and other shore communities vulnerable to flooding.

Sea Isle built its first pumping station in 2019 in the flood-prone area at the bay end of 38th Street and Sounds Avenue.

Altogether, the city is considering 10 areas throughout town that are vulnerable to flooding for pumping stations in the next five to 10 years, Savastano said.

Local resident Steve Cossaboon, who ran unsuccessfully for City Council in the May municipal election, urged city officials to extend the new pumping station’s reach one block south to 48th Street to protect the flood-prone area surrounding the Sea Isle City Library.

Savastano told Cossaboon he would check with the city engineer to see if the pumping station would provide any flooding protection around 48th Street.

“This might provide some relief for that area,” Savastano said.