The dock will be a floating barge, 250’x74′. Park executive director Garry White says that when the dock is not used for freight, it will provide “in-water marine services.” (GPIP image)
Sitka’s former mill site-turned-industrial park will finally have a dock.
The board of the Gary Paxton Industrial Park on Monday (11-14-16) selected a contractor to build a $6.8 million dollar floating dock at the site. Park CEO Garry White briefed the Sitka Chamber of Commerce about the project at its luncheon meeting this week (11-16-16).
Here’s an excerpt of his remarks.
It needed to be able to handle freight. We’ve got a large anchor tenant out there (Silver Bay Seafoods) that moves seafood. We’ve got potential for water bottling. So how can we get our freight in and out of there, and can that infrastructure work. Second, we wanted to make sure it could serve the commercial fishing fleet. Could a small troller pull up there if he didn’t have the dollars to get hauled out, could he tie up his boat and get some in-water work done, recognizing that some day the grid is going to go out due to EPA regulations. We wanted to have a place where a boat could tie up and do work — sort of like Eliason Harbor’s drive down float, but much bigger. We also said that if we’re going to do this, let’s make sure that the bids that come in, that we can expand off this and do other things in the future. Potentially have a small bulk water vessel come in, a cargo ship, maybe a research vessel. And at some point — and I’m not advocating for this — maybe a cruise ship. We didn’t want to two-block ourselves in too shallow water. We wanted to make sure it was still a deep-water dock. So we asked for that, and to expand, and we said, Boy we’d really like it to be floating if it fits in our budget.
Turnagain’s proposal allows for the dock to one day accommodate large vessels, with the addition of mooring dolphins. As it is, the dock can handle vessels with a 40-foot draft. (GPIG image)
On the first go-round, every bid the park received exceeded the $6.8 million in state transportation grants reserved for the project. After a second round of bidding, the park board selected Turnagain Marine Construction, which proposes repurposing a 250-foot barge for the dock, and connecting it to shore with a drive-down ramp.
The dock will have lights and power, and — because it’s a barge — water can be pumped into or out of it to adjust its height above the surface of the ocean, from 5 to 15 feet.
Park director Garry White was especially excited about the low annual maintenance costs of the barge — about $4,000 a year, and its 50-year life cycle.
But there was one elephant in the room. Much of the debate during this year’s local election centered on building a marine services center — including a large-vessel haul-out — at the site. One audience member asked White how this project related to that goal.
We had money to build this dock. We didn’t have money to build a haul-out. We had multiple public meetings and the public wanted both. But industry folks — we had attorneys showing up telling us that we needed to build that dock. So we thought about trying to transfer that money into a haul-out. There is an ability to put in some infrastructure over here — we’ve got quotes on it, we’ve done studies on it. It’s about $12 million bucks to put in that stuff. Anywhere from $4 million for a ramp with a little float on it, to $12 million bucks for a full-on marine ways to get a larger travel lift in.
White said it was unlikely that Sitka would be eligible for any state funding for a haul-out, with large travel lifts already operating in Hoonah and Wrangell. But he didn’t rule out an investment by private enterprise.
Rates for use of the dock will be comparable to those already in place in Sitka’s harbors.
Under the city’s new procurement rules, the contract with Turnagain Marine Construction must be approved by municipal administrator Mark Gorman before it can be awarded. The Sitka Assembly has previously authorized the dock appropriation. The assembly will also approve any contingency spending on the project.
