Coastal Services Center

The Project Study Site

Each of the hypothetical scenarios was designed for a real, 1,100-acre site located in coastal Georgia. The site is currently being developed by the Land Resources Companies. The developer shared base layer data with the project team but is under no obligation to implement any component of the hypothetical scenarios created for this project. Neither is the use of the site by this project an endorsement of the actual development currently underway.

The project site is located on a peninsula among the barrier islands, tidal creeks, and marshes of the Georgia coast. About 100 miles south of Savannah and 30 miles north of Jacksonville, Florida, it lies just to the west of Cumberland Island National Seashore in Camden County in the small town of St. Marys, Georgia. The Point Peter peninsula is bounded by the North River on the west, St. Marys River on the south, and Point Peter Creek on the east. Looking east across Point Peter Creek are views of salt marsh expanding out to Cumberland Sound and Cumberland Island beyond.

Site Ecology

The approximately 1,100-acre site includes 665 upland acres surrounded by salt marsh composed of smooth cordgrass (Spartina alterniflora) and black rush (Juncus robusts). The upland is a sandy substrate populated with a mix of mature maritime forest, long leaf pine savannah, plantation pine, and depressional wetlands. The maritime forest, subject to wind and salt spray, includes live and laurel oaks often draped with spanish moss and red cedar, loblolly pine, magnolia, red bay, holly, and palmetto. The maritime forest's shrub understory includes groundsel, wax myrtle, sea myrtle, and cabbage palmetto. The longleaf savannah hosts longleaf and loblolly pine forests interspersed with live oak with an understory of wiregrass, toothache grass, and occasional bog wetlands. The forested wetlands consist of areas with tupelo-gum and bald cypress known as tupelo-cypress forest. The bottomland flanks include red maple, sweet gum, loblolly pine, willow oak, laurel oak, cherry bark oak, ash, sycamore, holly, elm, and hackberry. Pine plantations – planted stands of single age slash pine or loblolly – are present as multiple stands of varying ages.

Culture

Culturally, the site is influenced by the town of St. Marys and by the recreational draw of intercoastal waters and Cumberland Island National Seashore. The town's waterfront and historic district downtown serve as the gateway to Cumberland Island with small restaurants, an outfitter, Bed and Breakfasts, and a 1920s-era hotel.

Transportation

The Point Peter project study site is located in St. Marys, Georgia (population 13,760), in Camden County. Situated among main east coast transportation lines, the Intracoastal Waterway passes just to the east. Interstate 95 and U.S. 17, the primary north/south highway routes, are 10 miles to the west, and Interstate 10, southernmost east/west highway route across the U.S., lies 40 miles south.

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