Rain garden could ease flooding in Nags Head

Creating a rain garden in Vista Colony near the Britthaven nursing center is one of the ideas Nags Head is pursuing as it tries to ease flooding in two neighborhoods.

Like other towns, Nags Head has been dealing with a high water table and flooding after heavy rain.

More than two feet have saturated the Outer Banks this fall and winter.

Public Works Director Dave Clark told town commissioners last week that creating a rain garden in Vista Colony and routing water from Northridge to the drainage ditch on U.S 158 could help with problems in those neighborhoods.

In Northridge, cleaning out an old drainage ditch to the highway would require easements from two property owners, Clark said. One property owner has already said he would allow the work to be done.

“He said he would have no problem whatsoever granting that easement,” Clark said.

The town could also create a swale that would not channel water out but would provide a place for it to settle, Clark said.

The problem in Vista Colony is a little more complicated and might mean giving the work to an outside contractor. That would require ditching and possibly a culvert to send water to a low-lying area next to Britthaven of the Outer Banks. There, a rain garden could be created.

A rain garden would use plants that require plenty of water. The hope is that they would effectively lower the water table.

In many parts of the Outer Banks, the persistent winter rain has raised the water table, in some neighborhoods up to the surface.

Kill Devil Hills has installed a temporary system of well points and a pump to draw the water table down in Ocean Acres. The town engineer recently reported some success with that method.

In Kitty Hawk, officials are looking into a federal program that acquires properties with chronic flooding problems.