Engineering Metarvik: moving Newtok across the river, away from the sea.

• Author: Seely, Nichelle
• Position: Special section: ENGINEERING & ARCHITECTURE

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The northeast edge of Nelson Island doesn't look like much from the air. Tents belonging to the Innovative Readiness Team cluster near the barge landing, which is a simple tongue of piles and gravel jutting out into the Ningaluk River. Our yellow float plane splashes into the water and nudges into the rocky shoreline, and I walk into the town-site of Mertarvik, the replacement site for Newtok.

The village of Newtok has been in the news for months; we've heard about the ocean encroaching from one side and the river from the other. Moving the village is an inevitable, albeit difficult, solution. Mertarvik is across the river, southeast from the village, accessible only by floatplane or fishing skiff. This area is known to the villagers as 'the place we go for water.' A clear spring bubbles out of the ground not far from the shoreline, and the grasses and sedges are rich and green. It's taken years of planning, but the first building has finally been erected--at least partially.

ENGINEERING A COMMUNITY

Engineering is the art of problem solving. What does it take to construct a community from the ground up? Like much of rural Alaska, Mertarvik is off the road system. Engineers and contractors are familiar with this state of affairs, and know how to solve the problems of logistics and transportation of materials. What makes Mertarvik unique and especially challenging is that it is essentially virgin territory. There's none of the infrastructure enjoyed by even the remotest village--no utilities, no roads, no landfill--nothing.

The first obstacle was actually getting materials to the building site. The barge is the best and obvious answer, so the first project in establishing the new community was to construct a barge landing. Completed in 2009, it was the first necessary foothold for the chain of events to follow.

It's an accepted fact that moving Newtok will take years. Unfortunately, the rate of erosion is increasing due to the growing severity of winter storms, and exacerbated by the reduced coverage of sea ice that historically has protected the village from the worst of the storm surge. In reality, Newtok may not have the luxury of years. In view of this implicit threat, the first planned structure at Mertarvik is an evacuation center: a building which can shelter 300 residents if the worst happens and Newtok is destroyed before the new town can be fully established. Mindful of the future, village leaders planned to...