Louis and Barbara Price have an up-close look at Lake Michigan from their living room window in Union Pier. They’ve lived for 40 years on the shoreline in a home built in 1935 by Louis’ grandfather, moving there from Chicago and raising their family amid a slower pace and magnificent view.
While the Prices actively worry about their own shoreline amid record-high water pummeling the coastline, their concerns keep growing broader: They’re worried about the greater New Buffalo community, which depends on the so-called “blue economy” of the Great Lakes.
“The whole economy in the area is because people come to go to the beaches,” said Louis Price.
“If there are no beaches, it’s going to cut down business at the bed and breakfasts (and) all of the stores. That’s going to affect a lot of people.”
Barbara Price, his wife, agrees. “That’s the economy here,” she said. “The tourists. There really is nothing else.”
Summer may be the best season in Michigan’s coastal towns, and that’s not just because of warm sunshine on the Great Lakes. The 100 days from Memorial Day to Labor Day can bring year-long prosperity to the state’s shorelines in the form of the $15.4 billion water tourism and recreation industry that generates an estimated $1 billion in tax revenues.
With coronavirus upending the nation’s economy this spring, towns along Michigan’s shore say they’ve still got more to lose when the crisis ends. Any look toward recovery this summer comes with the threat that record-setting water levels are likely to continue, bringing more erosion and more damage.
In Holland, flooding risks on Windmill Island are just one sign that Tulip Town could struggle for tourist dollars.
Renters planning on staying in a Fishtown shanty during a trip to Leland had to find other options after the seasonal rental was closed because too much water was getting into it.
The list keeps expanding: Alpena officials said city parks have been hit hard by damage. The Ludington Maritime Museum closed due to repeated flooding, while water is lapping at the Big Sable Lighthouse. The U.S. 2 scenic turnout in Manistique is washed out. Iconic Michigan moments like climbing to shore at Sleeping Bear Dunes, driving M-22 or cycling M-185 on Mackinac Island all could change this year.
One of the largest areas affected is South Haven, which already canceled July 4 fireworks, prompting overall estimates of $80 million in economic impact from high water this year.
Visitors planning on swimming, bicycling and boating anywhere in Michigan this summer may be shocked at the changes high water levels already bring to favorite vacation spots.
“There is not a lot of beach left anywhere in this state,” said Jerrod Sanders of the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy.
Related: Great Lakes high water ‘is going to affect everyone in Michigan’
That leaves Michigan’s shoreline communities economically vulnerable as predictions continue for record-high Great Lakes water.
“With tourism, in these coastal towns, if you don’t make it in four months of summer, you’re toast,” said Ezra Scott, Berrien County commissioner.
Towns brace for hit to tourism
Dustin Harvey turned to Lake Michigan in 2019 when he wanted to start a new business.
New Buffalo is close enough to Indiana that visitors have to check the time zone, too, when looking at a clock. The sandy shoreline that runs from Michigan City is home to dunes, bluffs and lakeshore homes priced at $1 million or more.
It’s a town where longtime residents will stay and raise families, or, like the Prices, move back when they want to put down roots. With a traditional downtown containing a mix of newer restaurants and hometown shops, New Buffalo feels like a city that offers more than the beach.
But with the demographic shift to vacation community, the city now looks forward to summer. Vacation rentals, winery tours and all of the year-round services needed to run a summer home drive a lot of the economy in the a city of fewer than 2,000 people where an estimated 75 percent of its housing stock is second homes.
So you can’t blame Harvey for being optimistic over the winter.
After winning the city contract to run the concession stand at the public beach, Harvey’s invested $75,000 to create a destination on the sand. New Buffalo Beach Club rents chairs and umbrellas, serves food and offers activities like volleyball games, cornhole tournaments, weekly family sandcastle competitions and treasure hunts.
The beach is on the “right” side of the pair of piers that jut out from the opening to a system of canals that create expansive docking for public and private boating clubs. The north side is retaining much of its sand, thanks to the complexity of wave action meeting the concrete extending into the water. The south side’s erosion extends along the coast. In between, high water can close the only road to the shore.
Harvey is trying to grow community pride, like through organizing New Buffalo’s first St. Patrick’s Day parade. He sees his new summer business continuing to grow, thanks to the beach.
“I walk the beach every two days to see what’s going on,” Harvey said. He’s finding a lot of debris and some moved concrete benches, but so far the beach is intact.
Michigan’s coastal towns so far project about $63 million in damage from high water. That figure grows when considering costs to state systems, like roads and parks, that also are threatened by erosion. Communities collectively face up to an estimated half-billion or more in losses when potential lost tourist revenue enters the equation.
A report completed at the end of December by the Institute for Service Research for the Michigan Port Collaborative looked at the dollar volume generated in Michigan’s coastline towns and ports. While direct water-based tourism reached $8.5 billion, the total economic impact was $15.4 billion, according to the reseachers.
“Throughout Michigan, our coastlines are critical not only for our quality of life but different types of recreational activity,” said Mary Beth Stutzman, president and CEO of the Alpena Area Convention and Visitor Bureau.
Stutzman called tourism a top industry, and expressed concern about high water levels hurting it.
Municipalities are pressing the state for increased attention to the high-water problem, and Stutzman said tourism has to be on the list of concerns.
“We have to come together as coastal communities around the state,” she said,” and as a state understand how things like this can impact our tourism industry.”
Scott, a New Buffalo native, said he’s used state-level and federal connections to raise awareness of how powerless people living in lake towns feel about the high water threat to their community. Part of the problem affects private homes, which is many cases means seasonal residents are hurt. But, he said, it’s a problem that has to be viewed with a wider lens: The community’s livelihood is at risk through the damage to beaches and risks to marinas.
“They really rely on that tourism dollar,” Scott said. “What is going to happen if people aren’t going to be coming here because there are no beaches."
Lake Huron shoreline affected
Rogers City is about 350 miles northeast of New Buffalo, but there are similarities. Rogers City doesn’t get the influx of high-income tourists or see the multi-million lakefront summer homes built nearby, yet it’s also dealing with concerns about what damage to its shore will mean to its future.
Mayor Scott McLennan speaks with pride about recent years when Rogers City began attracting softball tournaments to the city of 2,700 on Lake Huron. The population is projected to fall by 800 in the next U.S. Census, McLennan said, “when we can’t afford to lose eight.”
Struggles show in vacant downtown storefronts, but the city has been turning to summer programming to bolster its economic base. A new pirate-themed festival is scheduled for July 4. A volunteer will make sure free music events take place every Friday night in summer, instead of just a few. Marketing the 123-slip Rogers City Marina is a city goal, even without a fully staffed Chamber of Commerce.
But the loss of the city beach to the high water makes McLennan nervous. It’s just a sign of how much more damage is out there, each of it threatening to alter how visitors experience summer.
“We’re working hard to put Rogers City back on track,” he said.
To many people who’ve lived there for a long time or more recently moved to northeast Lower Peninsula as retirees, the beauty of the “sunrise side” makes them wonder why it struggles. Homes in Rogers City might sell for less than $50,000 just a few blocks from Lake Huron.
The Lake Huron shoreline is rockier than across the peninsula, and it doesn’t have the sunsets. But it also has clear water, clear enough that the region is a national draw for people wanting to scuba dive near shipwrecks. Birch trees and tall pines build a backdrop for bicycle trails that connect towns to parks, and nearby rivers promise good fishing.
“It’s a destination for a beautiful, unspoiled environment,” McLennan said.
The last six months have signaled too many changes for the community. The extent of the damage to the shoreline won’t be known until spring, but the high water is changing the contours of Rogers City’s identity. A bike path to the state park was damaged, and remaining beach will be pressured by the water. Waves rush over the breakwall next to the marina, leaving McLennan concerned about its future. Even US-23 threatened collapse north of town. The state moved boulders into bolster the road, rolling them into place between the highway and Lake Huron.
McLennan and other officials in town want tourism to keep expanding the town’s hopes for the future. They see ways to keep building it on the coastline, but they’re struggling with not knowing what they’ll be able to offer this summer.
“We really are counting on showcasing our natural resources to tourists,” McLennan added. “It’s a wonderful destination. We’re a small community, but we sure do prosper from folks coming here.”
Flooding in southeast Michigan
Luna Pier is tucked away in the southeast corner of the state, where exit 6 along I-75 offers the highway’s only direct access to Lake Erie.
The city of about 1,500 people now looks at that connection and wants to make the most of it, following the closure of Consumers Energy’s J.R. Whiting coal-burning power plant. That facility was responsible for 65 percent of the city’s revenue, forcing it to make steep spending cuts. “It was a hard hit,” said Mayor Jim Gardner.
Looking ahead, it’s the lake, Gardner said, that represents the best chances of growth for the bedroom community for both Toledo and Monroe, south of Metro Detroit. Officials see other small towns like New Buffalo and Rogers City trying to retain visitor spending, but Luna Pier is in the position of trying to establish new revenue from it. It wants a piece of that from the 60,000 or so vehicles that pass its exit daily. “There’s a lot of money going down I-75,” Gardner said.
Years ago, those drivers may not have known about Luna Pier. “We can’t afford that luxury now,” Gardner said. “We want to become a tourist destination.”
Unclear, though, is what the high lake forecasts mean for that goal. Lake Erie levels were a foot higher in February than a year earlier, and it’s expected to set new monthly record highs from March to May, before dipping below records for June, July and August.
Most of the city is both in the flood plain and behind a dike system that protects structures when northeast winds from storms that may originate on the other side of the lake push high waves toward Luna Pier.
Unlike West Michigan homeowners who worry about erosion, residents of Luna Pier may wake up to flooded roads and homes full of water from waves. Some are using a federal program to pay for raising their houses onto high foundations. The city, meanwhile, has been able to buy a used portable pump to help clear road ways by pumping water back into Lake Erie.
Gardner is watching forecasts for spring and hoping for the best. In the meantime, he knows “there’s not a lot to spend money on when you get here, and we’re trying to correct that.”
Because of the dike catching sand, “we still have the public beach,” Gardner said, though it’s smaller. “There’s still enough there that people can enjoy it.
“It’s definitely our most important asset.”
‘What will we be left with?’
Erosion prevention isn’t just a municipal concern on Lake Michigan. Beachfront hospitality is changing, with some private rentals disclosing their loss of beach in online listings and larger properties turning to expensive solutions.
The Inn at Bay Harbor filed plans with the state to add up to four tons of limestone along its shore to protect the 113-room resort on Little Traverse Bay south of Petoskey.
A 20-year revetment wall put in place to protect the slope of the property took a beating during the wind-driven waves of fall and early winter, said Michael Costello, general manager.
“It’s taken quite a beating,” Costello said. “Water gets into rocks, starts to erode the grass, and smaller stones get moved out … and onto the beach.”
High water also is changing plans at Fishtown, the historic Great Lakes fishing pier north of Traverse City in Leland. Now maintained as a nonprofit, Fishtown’s fund-raising accelerated as water damaged the cheese shanty, forcing director Amanda Holmes to have the structure moved by crane so a higher foundation could be built.
But the urgency hasn’t abated. With $1 million in savings, Fishtown faces $2.5 million to confront the immediate needs from water damage.
“There’s an odd sense of numbness,” Holmes said. “When people come in and see the water, if they haven’t been there for a year or two, there’s a look of utter shock.”
Some towns say they’ve tried to establish tourist draws that go beyond the shorelines.
“Some say tourists will come anyway because they like so many wineries, breweries, the casino,” Barbara Price said of New Buffalo.
Dave Lorenz of Travel Michigan says those types of options will keep Michigan’s tourist industry going no matter how high the water gets in the Great Lakes. Other types of tourism, he said, can balance out the lack of beach or shoreline damage to recreation facilities.
That could mean pushing visitor attention to the 11,000 inland lakes, though experts say they, too, face many flooding risks. Still, Lorenz said, “they’re an option for a traveler looking for a beachfront experience."
But that’s a tough consideration for places like Petoskey, which is losing bicycle and walking trails and knows its marina condition could change by spring.
Kendall Klingelsmith, the director of parks and recreation for the city, feels the pressure.
“Our job is to make sure that experience is great, so that people come back,” he said.
“But we’re concerned with the what-ifs,” he said. “This summer, next year, when does it end? Will it end, and what will we be left with?”
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Great Lakes high water ‘is going to affect everyone in Michigan’
Damage from high Great Lakes levels prompts South Haven to close marina