After conducting test borings at both Surf Drive and the Heights Beach locations in early 2021 (see photos) to determine site suitability for the landfall of cables from Mayflower’s 804-megawatt offshore wind project south of Martha’s Vineyard, it has now been determined that the Surf Drive site is “unsuitable” due to issues with existing electric and fiber optic cables running to Martha’s Vineyard and presumably also due to the fact that Surf Drive is such a low lying coastal area very vulnerable to storms and coastal erosion.
After rejecting the Surf Drive landfall site, Mayflower continues to study the feasibility of the location at the foot of Worcester Avenue at the east end of the Falmouth Heights Beach parking lot which would result in the cables being trenched under Worcester Avenue/Court enroute to an inland substation preliminarily identified on Blacksmith Shop Road.
Additionally, Mayflower has now identified a second possible site in the Heights area at the foot of Central Park Ave at the west end of Falmouth Heights Beach. The route shown with a green line on their “Falmouth” web page map (scroll down to “Making landfall”) would then be trenched under Central Park Avenue and west to Falmouth Heights Road enroute to the inland substation. The study of this newly identified site is in the preliminary phase and will no doubt require test boring and town permits. Mayflower is currently conducting a GIS* study for this site.
It should be noted that the exact route of either of these sites in the Heights has not been determined yet.
Everyone in the Heights should be aware of this ongoing project. For more information on this project, please refer to the links on our Mayflower Wind Project Information website page which we are endeavoring to update with the most current information available.
*GIS: graphic information system – a technology that connects data and mapping information.