Feds Approve $24M for Long Awaited Work on Cape May Seawall

Work on a Cape May City seawall, identified as a weak point in the city's protection after Superstorm Sandy's flooding, has been approved to begin in the fall of this year.

Cape May's City Seawall Flood Mitigation Project has received authorization to move forward with more than $24.3 million in federal funding.

The authorization was confirmed in a statement from U.S. Rep Jeff Van Drew on Friday, with funding from the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security.

Cape May intends to put the bid out for the job as soon as the grant is fully processed and to hopefully start construction in fall 2026.

A New Seawall Planned for Cape May

The plans for the seawall and promenade improvement were drawn up in 2022, but the work had been in need since Sandy's storm damage in 2012.

Work will include extending the seawall and promenade from the existing area just East of Madison Ave to Wilmington Ave and extending down Wilmington Ave, according to those 2022 plans posted on the city's website.

The existing Cape May seawall was built after the 1962 storm, which devastated Cape May’s beachfront. It had been 50 years since the city had seen a storm of that magnitude.

“This is a major breakthrough for Cape May and for our entire shoreline,” Van Drew said in the statement. “This section of Cape May was identified after Hurricane Sandy as a serious weak point, and that vulnerability has not gone away.”