Essex CountyMassachusetts
Salem, Massachusetts
The town has won $6.0M in state resilience grants across 14 awards. Bedrock sits a median 8 ft down across 28 logs, shallower than the Massachusetts median of 24 ft.
- Live · as of Sep 11, 2026
- 9 public sources · method
- ← All towns
Median depth to bedrock
8 ft
middle half 5–12 ft · 28 logs
Bridges rated poor
2
of 12 inventoried
State resilience grants
$6.0M
14 awards on file
Construction projects
33
median $1.8M · public bid results
01 · Money & permits
$6.0M in state resilience grants, 14 awards
| Project | Year | Award |
|---|---|---|
| Columbus Avenue Seawall Reconstruction | FY2026 | $1.4M |
| Forest River Park Seawall Repair | FY2018 | $1.2M |
| Columbus Avenue Seawall | FY2021 | $953K |
| Resilient Together: Collins Cove Park Neighborhood | FY2025 | $500K |
| Palmer Cove Resiliency Enhancements and Community Engagement on Climate Change and Emergency Preparedness | FY2023 | $480K |
| Winter Island Park Pathway and Bank Restoration Project Phase 2 | FY2025 | $419K |
| Beach Avenue Seawall Reconstruction Design | FY2026 | $290K |
| Collins Cove Salt Marsh Restoration Project | FY2019 | $217K |
Largest 8 of 14 awards shown.
Public construction projects
33
Median estimated value $1.8M, middle half $929K–$10.0M, against $1.5M across Massachusetts. Capped total $359M (each project counted at no more than $100M). Public bid records compiled June 2026, heavy on 2021–22 — a sample, not an annual market.
02 · Ground
Rock is close to the surface: 71% of logs hit it within 10 ft
From 28 depth-to-rock records inside Salem (MassGIS / MGS borings & well logs). Logs cluster where people drill wells and bore for roads, so treat this as the town’s pattern, not a site answer.
Half of Salem's logs reach rock between 5 and 12 ft
Depth to bedrock: 10th–90th percentile whisker, middle-half box, median tick; dashed line = Massachusetts median.
median 8 ftMA 24 ft
01020 ft
n = 28 logsSource: MassGIS / MGS borings & well logs
▸ Show the numbers▾ Hide the numbers
| Depth to rock (ft) | Logs |
|---|---|
| 0–5 | 6 |
| 5–10 | 11 |
| 10–20 | 6 |
| 20–50 | 3 |
| 50–100 | 2 |
| 100+ | 0 |
Rock within 10 ft
71%
of logs (23% across Massachusetts). Shallow rock means ledge in excavations, refusal for driven piles and rock anchors rather than soil nails; deep ground means taller shoring and more groundwater. 7% of logs here go past 50 ft.
03 · Bridges
2 of 12 bridges are rated poor — above the Massachusetts rate of 9%
Every highway bridge and large culvert in the 2025 National Bridge Inventory that stands inside Salem. Median age 75 years; 1 posted for weight.
8% good, 17% poor
FHWA good / fair / poor rating — the lowest of deck, superstructure, substructure or culvert.
- Good1 · 8%
- Fair9 · 75%
- Poor2 · 17%
n = 12 structuresSource: FHWA National Bridge Inventory 2025
▸ Show the numbers▾ Hide the numbers
| Built | Structures |
|---|---|
| pre-1910 | 1 |
| 1910s | 1 |
| 1920s | 1 |
| 1940s | 2 |
| 1950s | 5 |
| 1990s | 2 |
The poor-rated bridges
| Carries | Over | Built | Daily traffic |
|---|---|---|---|
| ST114 NORTH ST | NORTH RIVER | 1952 | 30,550 |
| JEFFRSON AV | PARALLEL ST | 1920 | 25,000 |
04 · Dams & disasters
Essex County has drawn $107M in federal disaster repair since 2010
FEMA Public Assistance is reported by county, so the figure below is Essex County-wide context, not a Salem number.
FEMA Public Assistance, Essex County
$107M
Federal share obligated across 1,095 projects in 10 declared disasters since 2010. The largest category is emergency protective measures (79%); roads & bridges took $1.3M.
05 · Next door
Salem and the 6 towns that border it
A dash means no data for that layer, not zero.
| Town | Poor bridges | Rock depth |
|---|---|---|
| Salem, MA | 2 / 12 | 8 ft |
| Peabody, MA | 4 / 31 | 21 ft |
| Danvers, MA | 2 / 22 | 24 ft |
| Beverly, MA | 4 / 12 | 10 ft |
| Lynn, MA | 1 / 6 | 8 ft |
| Swampscott, MA | 1 / 2 | 8 ft |
| Marblehead, MA | 1 / 1 | 8 ft |
Where these numbers come from
Method, sources & caveats
Salem is the Census county subdivision 2500959105 (Essex County). Every record is placed here by its coordinates, not by the place name the source uses. Construction-project figures come from Massachusetts public bid results, published as town-level counts, medians and capped totals (n ≥ 10).
- Towns are Census county subdivisions: cities, towns, plantations, and Maine/New Hampshire unorganized territories and townships. Every record is placed in a town by its coordinates (point-in-polygon), not by the source's own place label — so a bridge in Roxbury counts for Boston and a well in 'North Waltham' counts for Waltham.
- Bridges: FHWA NBI 2025, highway structures ≥ 20 ft including large culverts. 'Poor' is FHWA's good/fair/poor rating (lowest of deck, superstructure, substructure or culvert ≤ 4). Percent-poor is shown only for towns with at least 5 structures.
- Depth to bedrock is the median of driller- and boring-reported depths in the town, shown only where at least 10 logs exist. Water-well logs over-sample rural lots and hilltops; one town median never describes a particular site.
- Bedrock depths use the same state databases and filters as the Bedrock & soils module (bedrock wells and borings that reached rock, 0 < depth ≤ 400 ft, exact re-filings dropped), but every log is placed in a town by its coordinates rather than the driller's town field, so town counts can differ slightly between the two pages. Connecticut and Rhode Island have no statewide public well-log database with depths.
- Dams: only high-hazard-potential dams whose latest condition assessment is Poor or Unsatisfactory are counted (live NID). Connecticut and Rhode Island assessments may lag.
- FEMA Public Assistance dollars are federal share obligated for disasters declared since 2010, reported by county — they are county context, not a town figure.
- Grant awards are Massachusetts only (EEA Dam & Seawall program, MVP Action grants, CZM Coastal Resilience). Other states' programs are not yet included.
- Ground-related permit counts cover only the municipal portals the pipeline reads (Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Worcester, Framingham, Providence, Portsmouth, Hartford and a few others) — an absent count means 'not covered', not zero.
- Data as of
- Sep 11, 2026
- Generated
- Sep 11, 2026
- Records
- 367,748
- Refresh
- Live pull · weekly
- U.S. Census Bureau cartographic boundary files — county subdivisions (2024, 1:500k)Public domain
- FHWA National Bridge Inventory (2025 delimited files)Public domain
- USACE National Inventory of DamsPublic domainHigh-hazard dams rated Poor or Unsatisfactory (live NID).
- USGS U.S. Landslide InventoryPublic domain
- MassGIS / Massachusetts Geological Survey — Bedrock Data PointsPublic recordBorings and well logs that reached rock (MassDEP well drillers, USGS, MWRA, MassDOT…); seismic/HVSR and map-derived shallow-bedrock/outcrop points excluded.
- NH DES Water Well Inventory, Maine Geological Survey Wells Database, Vermont DEC well recordsPublic recordBedrock wells only; driller-reported depth to bedrock / overburden thickness.
- OpenFEMA Public Assistance Funded Projects Details (v2)Public domain
- MA EEA / CZM grant awards — Dam & Seawall, MVP Action, CZM Coastal ResiliencePublic record
- Municipal open-data permit portals (Boston, Cambridge, Somerville, Providence, Portsmouth, others)Public recordOnly permits flagged as ground-related (retaining walls, excavation, foundations) are counted.
Published by Earth Support Corp as a public resource. Regional statistics for planning and curiosity. They are not an engineering report, a bid recommendation or a statement about any particular site, firm or project. Spot an error? Tell us and we will correct it. Full method: methodology.