Archers Creek is a residential subdivision in the Town of Emerald Isle, NC. The neighborhood is on the sound side, north of Emerald Drive or Hwy 58 and extends from Lee Street on the West to Archers Point on the East. The properties on either side of Archers Creek Drive form the backbone of the neighborhood. Many of the homes in this neighborhood date back to the 1980's and 1990's. Roughly half of the homes are primary residences while the balance secondary or vacation homes. A few of the vacation homes are available for rent on a weekly basis.
About 46% of the properties are direct waterfront, with docks extending into Archers Creek. One of the "sweet spots" of water front living, homes face south onto Archers Creek. In the summer, residents can enjoy the cooling breezes coming over the water from the southwest. In winter, the homes are shielded from the cold winter winds originating from the northeast.
But, not all is well with the creek, itself. And, here some residents along the west end of Archers Creek are pressing the Town of Emerald Isle, NC to address problems they say are destroying the stream and its ecological value, along with its use. The west end of the creek has become stagnant in recent years,” Johnathan Casey said in an interview last week. “There’s just not enough water flow, a result of a “choke point” in the troubled creek, a crumbling and clogged culvert under Lee Avenue.
The once tidally-influenced section of the creek, which is a tributary of Bogue Sound and runs behind the Emerald Isle Plantation Shopping Center and the old town hall on the north side of Highway 58, has become a haven for freshwater vegetation as the ecology has changed, Mr. Casey said. The creek is rapidly filling with mud, silt and freshwater vegetation to the point where it’s “disappearing” west of the Lee Avenue culvert.
Ideally, Mr. Casey said, the creek would be dredged and cleaned up and the freshwater vegetation removed. This section of the creek, however, is designated as a primary nursery area by the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries as it was once a haven for juveniles of many marine species. Dredging permits are almost impossible to obtain for primary nursery areas (PNA), even those that no longer function as a PNA or support shellfish.
In that sense, Archers Creek is similar to many other urban creeks, which have been paved over with roads and culverts, becoming clogged with sediment.
So, Mr. Casey, who has a degree from N.C. State University’s biological and agricultural engineering program, with a concentration in environmental engineering, has come up with an alternative – remove the Lee Street culvert and replace it with a much larger one to allow better water flow. He suggests using a box culvert, which he says is pre-cast, easier and less time-consuming to install than a bridge with a pipe underneath it.
This, Mr. Casey said, would increase tidal flows, restoring to at least some degree the natural hydrology of the creek. The “increased salinity,” he said, “should eradicate the invasive freshwater vegetation (phragmites and cattails)” over time and flush out some of the sediment, which he believes is 5 to 6 feet deep and likely “contaminated.”
The Town of Emerald Isle recently spent $3 million in mostly grant money to buy 30 acres of land along a more westerly section of the creek, behind the old town hall and
recreation/community center. The area is mostly maritime forest, but the town has created trails and is considering use of up to 10 acres for active recreation, such as a dog park and ballfields. Opening up the creek would significantly enhance that property, which the town has named McLean-Spell Park, after two of Emerald Isle’s founding families. Making Archers Creek more like its old self would provide for recreational access, such as kayaking and paddle boarding, to the town’s 30-acre nature park.
Randy Mason, a longtime resident who lives along the creek on Archers Creek Drive, east of the culvert, remembers growing oysters under his dock before the water got too fresh to support them and being able to catch enough shrimp for a good dinner in an hour or less. Those days are long gone, he said.
He also remembers being able to turn his 20-foot boat around easily near the culvert, something he can’t do now. “Now it’s closed to shellfishing,” he added Monday. “I remember flounder in here, red drum, even, once, a bluefin tuna. There were lots of baitfish, mud minnows and menhaden.”
In short, Mr. Mason recalls the creek as a thriving estuarine stream and he said it’s worth saving and rehabilitating, because despite the changes, it’s an important habitat – home to ducks, herons, egrets, ibis, osprey, kingfishers, white tail deer, otters, rabbits and turtles. The habitat, he said, “needs to be preserved,” not allowed to fade away.
In short, Mr. Mason called the existing situation “sad” and noted it’s much worse than it was as little as four or five years ago. He doesn’t blame the town, at least not only the town, and doesn’t expect miracles overnight. But, he said, “It needs attention. It’s basically been ignored for a long time.”
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