Posted on March 21, 2022
EMERALD ISLE — Town commissioners Monday night approved a $91,455 contract to dredge the channel that leads to and from the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission boat launching facility.
Action came during a special meeting in the town hall, about one week after the town received only one bid and the board couldn’t open it during its regular monthly meeting.
The town readvertised for bids and got two. Coastal Dredging LCC of Sneads Ferry was the lower of the two and got the contract. The other bid, from Brooks Dredging and Marin of Harkers Island, was $136,880.
The town had estimated the cost of the project at $90,000.
“The project start date has not yet been determined,” town manager Matt Zapp said in an email Thursday. “Emerald Isle and Coastal Dredging desire to complete the project before Memorial Day 2022,” which is Monday, May 30.
Mr. Zapp said the project is much needed.
“The North Carolina Wildlife Boat Ramp is a highly desirable and used public access point within Emerald Isle,” he said. “The town appreciates its partnership with the state to provide such a high-caliber recreational opportunity to boaters. The improved depths within the ramp area will provide increased ease and safety for all.”
Two-thirds of the money will come from the N.C. Shallow Draft Inlet and Aquatic Weed Fund, which receives revenue from boat motor fuel taxes. The state will also pay the other third, as it owns the facility, east of the town hall in Bogue Sound off Highway 58.
The project will remove 995 cubic yards of material from the channel, from the WRC launch basin to about channel marker No. 28. The water farther into the Bogue Sound and out to the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway is still deep enough and won’t be dredged, according to the town manager.
A bucket dredge will load the dredged material onto a barge, which will take it to shore to be hauled away and disposed of at a permitted site.
The town and boaters say the work is necessary because chronic shoaling is creating a boat-and-trailer logjam as boaters encounter shallow water leaving and returning to the facility.
The facility includes four launching ramps and parking for 112 vehicle/ trailer combinations and a separate parking lot with 18 single-vehicle spaces. It is managed by the WRC and open 24 hours a day, every day of the year. There is no fee to use it.
