Homer Spit Coastal Erosion Mitigation

Damage from powerful coastal storm surge events on the Homer Spit is undermining the portion of the Sterling Highway - Alaska Route 1 that connects the Kenai Peninsula mainland to organizations like the United States Coast Guard and the Alaska Marine Highway and will ultimately, if left unchecked, diminish the role the Homer Spit plays as a regional commerce center and transportation hub for Southcentral Alaska.

There are also over one hundred private businesses that depend on the Sterling Highway as their gateway to conduct business, as well as vital City infrastructure needed to support the marine trades and cargo shipping services.  Coastal erosion from these events is destroying the State right-of-way, as well as properties housing commercial businesses, public recreational and camping sites and utilities. 

The City of Homer has been working for many years with the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT&PF) in a cooperative effort to develop and implement a long term maintenance plan to mitigate and stabilize erosion conditions on the Homer Spit. 

Attachments to this page provides an overview of erosion conditions on the Homer Spit, including specific condition photos. The USACE has conducted two extensive studies with detailed erosion management information: the 2017 USACE Dredged Material Management Guidance Manual and the 1987 USACE investigation and report titled Storm Damage Reduction Final Interim Feasibility Report with Engineering Design and Environmental Assessment.  In 2019, HDR, Inc. completed a technical memo summarizing erosional conditions and providing mitigation recommendations.

After a storm surge event in November 2024 destroyed part of the Homer Spit Road and led to a State-declared emergency disaster, HDR provided another technical memo draft summarizing short-term, emergency mitigation measures as well as an evaluation of a few long-term mitigation measures.

Future work on this mitigation project will utilize this information and develop new data to help the group and the public evaluate a range of coastal resiliency measures and formulate a long-term plan for maintaining the Homer Spit transportation infrastructure of local, regional and national importance.  Beginning this project is timely and would likely be best served through a USACE General Investigation.

A cooperative team, comprised of the USACE, DOT&PF and City of Homer operating under a Memorandum of Agreement will be able to produce an action plan to be implemented that will have long term solutions to the storm surge and erosion challenges on the Homer Spit.