'Just devastating': Borden-Carleton man worried as debris from fabrication yard erodes nearby marsh

John Read looks over the marsh he's been visiting since he was a child on the shores of Borden-Carleton.

It's where clams, quahogs, geese and ducks used to live.But now, according to Read, their habitat has been destroyed by dust and gravel washing in from the fabrication yard.

Debris chewing marsh away

Read said recently, more dust and gravel from the fabrication yard has been falling into the waters and at a faster rate. That debris has been chewing away at nearby shorelines and settling into the marsh.

"It's just killed the whole interior of the marsh," Read said.He also saidthe problem has been exacerbated by several storms this spring and rising sea levels.

"Saturday I just watched like tons of gravel enter the system. It's going along the shore undermining all the shore and eating its way into the marsh over there. The marsh now has no clams, no oysters, no eel grass," he said.

"There's not even any mud fish down there. It's justa sandbar now."

Read said the destruction has been happening quickly, with a dyke along the shoreline eroding over the span of two days.

Province monitoring the area

Strait Crossing Bridge Limited, the company that operates Confederation Bridge,originally purchased the land to build components of thebridge during its construction decades ago.

Theprovincebought the land in 2009 for just over $350,000, and ithas remained undeveloped since.

The Department of Environment said it is aware of the issue and that the entire area is being severely impacted by natural coastal erosion.

"The gravel deposit forms a very small point in the area, which is also being eroded and is unfortunately intensifying the impacts," it said in a statement sent to CBC.

In a statement, Finance PEI, which owns the land,said it"will continue to monitor the situation and will consider any measures that could or should be taken to mitigate the erosion."

For Read, those measures couldn't be taken soon enough. "I grew up here ...I've been here all my life and I've watched it slowly destroyed," he said.

"It's just devastating all around here. It's got to be fixed."

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