Seawall & Bulkhead Guide: Wells, Maine

Dune Rebuild, Not Seawall: What Wells Is Actually Building in 2026

The single largest current coastal-defense investment touching Wells is a $5.1 million York County dune-rebuild project, and it is worth being precise about what that is: a soft engineering response using dredged sand and dune grass, not a new seawall or bulkhead. Per the Portland Press Herald (March 1, 2026), corroborated by The Maine Monitor and DredgeWire, the January 2024 winter storms caused an estimated $40 million in public damage across York County and destroyed or damaged 28% of dunes along four coastal segments, including Wells Beach.

Dredging began in January 2026 after federal permitting delays, using York County's own sand dredge, purchased in 2021-2022 with American Rescue Plan Act funds. At Wells Beach specifically, roughly 7,600 to 8,150 cubic yards of sand (sources vary slightly) were pumped from Wells Harbor onto the storm-damaged beach through a pipeline running more than 2,000 feet, and SWCA Environmental Consulting planted more than 100,000 dune-grass seedlings between roughly February 16 and February 20, 2026. Funding is split roughly 75% FEMA, 15% Maine Emergency Management Agency, and 10% municipalities, per one account (another cites a 75% federal, 25% state-and-municipal split).

County officials, including Emergency Preparedness Coordinator Chris McCall and Emergency Management Director Arthur Cleaves, have been explicit that this project was built only to a five-year flood-protection standard, and that it is intended as a first phase, not a finished solution. A separate $50 million Phase 2 project targeting full 100-year flood protection is still seeking funding, with a pending $75 million state coastal-resilience bond measure cited as one potential source. There is no comparable town-wide seawall or bulkhead construction program for Wells in this research — the current, funded, in-progress coastal-defense story here is dunes, not hard armor.

Historical Sediment Loss: Dredging, Jetties, and 1.2 Million Cubic Yards

Wells's erosion story did not start with the 2024 storms. A 2015 Portland Press Herald account ("Sand purchase puts focus on Wells Beach erosion") cited then-state geologist Steve Dickson's research attributing roughly 1.2 million cubic yards of historical sediment loss along Wells's beaches to two specific human-made causes: harbor-dredging operations between 1970 and 1974, which relocated an estimated 750,000 cubic yards of sand, and jetty construction in the 1960s, which trapped an estimated 500,000 cubic yards in accretion zones — areas where sand built up but became legally and practically difficult to redistribute back onto eroding beaches.

That combination is a useful frame for anyone evaluating a Wells property: the erosion pressure here is not purely a story of storms and sea-level rise, it is also a decades-old, documented consequence of harbor and jetty engineering decisions made before most current owners bought their properties. It helps explain why a public dune-rebuild project, rather than a one-time storm-damage repair, has become the town's primary current coastal-defense tool.

A Drakes Island Homeowner's Account — One Data Point, Not a Seawall Survey

The same 2015 Portland Press Herald story includes a specific, on-the-record account from a Drakes Island-area homeowner: a private seawall that was "about 6 feet deep" had shrunk to "about a foot and a half," and the property had lost roughly 300 feet of dune and vegetation since 1990 through successive winter storms. This is genuinely useful as an illustrative example of what long-term erosion pressure can do to a private structure on this stretch of coast.

It is important to be precise about what this account is and is not. It is one homeowner's testimony reported in a single 2015 news story, not a systematic engineering survey of Drakes Island seawalls, and not a town-wide inventory of private hard structures and their condition. Maine Geological Survey maintains a dedicated "Dune Geology - Drakes Island Beach, South, Wells" document (via digitalmaine.com) that could contain a more rigorous, site-specific erosion-rate figure, but this research did not read that document in full text. Treat the 6-feet-to-18-inches figure as a real, sourced, single-property anecdote worth citing as an example — not as a defensible Drakes Island-wide or Wells-wide erosion rate.

Maine's Shoreland Zoning Act and the Wells Permitting Gap

Any private seawall or bulkhead in Wells would need to be evaluated against Maine's statewide Mandatory Shoreland Zoning Act, administered by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (maine.gov/dep/land/slz/). That law governs setbacks, vegetation clearing, and development within shoreland zones for every Maine coastal or waterbody-adjacent municipality, Wells included — its general applicability to Wells is confirmed.

What this research did not confirm is the specific detail a homeowner actually needs: Wells's own local shoreland-zoning ordinance text, its exact setback distances from the water, or the town's particular permitting requirements and review process for a new or replacement private seawall or bulkhead. That local ordinance is most likely codified through eCode360, the same platform hosting the town's other municipal code chapters, but this pass did not extract it. Anyone planning private shoreline armoring in Wells should treat this as a real, disclosed gap and contact Wells's own Code Enforcement Office directly, alongside Maine DEP, before assuming any setback distance, permit type, or approval timeline.

What This Research Could Not Confirm

This page does not identify a town-wide public seawall or bulkhead construction or funding project for Wells comparable to what other coastal markets on this site have documented — no such project surfaced in this research, and the honest read is that Wells's current public coastal-defense story is dune restoration, not seawall or bulkhead building. It also does not give a Drakes Island-specific erosion rate as confirmed fact, a parcel-level FEMA flood-zone breakdown (Zone VE versus Zone AE) for Wells, or Wells's own local shoreland-ordinance setback distances and permitting steps for private hard structures.

None of those gaps were filled with an invented figure here. A build agent or a homeowner should independently verify current status directly with Wells's Code Enforcement Office, Maine DEP, and, for storm-damage or dune-project specifics, York County's Emergency Management office before treating any number on this page as this year's final word.

Practical Takeaways for a Wells Buyer or Owner

If you are evaluating a property near Wells Beach, Drakes Island, Crescent Beach, or Moody Beach, do not assume the $5.1 million dune-rebuild project functions as seawall protection for a specific parcel — it is sand and dune grass, engineered to a five-year flood-protection standard, not a hard structure, and the $50 million Phase 2 aimed at 100-year protection is still unfunded. Confirm directly with York County and the Town of Wells which segments were included in the 2026 work and what maintenance or replenishment schedule follows it.

If you are considering building, repairing, or replacing a private seawall or bulkhead on a Wells parcel, expect the project to route through both Maine's statewide Shoreland Zoning Act and Wells's own local shoreland ordinance and Code Enforcement Office review — contact both directly, along with a licensed Maine coastal engineer, before assuming a setback distance, permit type, or cost for your specific property. And treat the Drakes Island homeowner's account of a seawall shrinking from about 6 feet deep to about a foot and a half as a real, illustrative warning sign about long-term erosion pressure on this coast, not as a stand-in for a professional site-specific erosion assessment.