FAIRHOPE – Repairs to bulkheads damaged by Hurricane Sally and a dredged channel are among the improvements planned at the Fairhope Marina, city officials said.
The Fairhope City Council voted Monday, Aug, 9 to approve bulkhead repairs at the city marina on Sea Cliff Drive. Asphalt Services was the low bidder with a submission of $329,867.77.
Richard Johnson, public works director, said most of the cost of the project will be covered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“This has been a lagging response from Hurricane Sally,” Johnson said. “We went out for bids, did not receive bids, had to rebid it and we did finally two responsive bidders.”
The work will include repairing an area on the east side of the property along Fly Creek.
“We just literally had a complete bulkhead failure and that will be brand-new construction, 125 linear feet and includes two replacement finger piers,” Johnson said. “We’re calling for it to be put back as built, but again if the marina manager says it would be a little bit better to equalize these.”
Council President Jack Burrell said the city could consider making additions to the docks while the repairs are going on.
“I’m pretty pleased with these prices and it wouldn’t be much to add another couple of finger piers if we needed to,” Burrell said. “I don’t think and now would be the time to do it. If we’re adding additional, the income from the additional slips would offset that pretty quickly.”
Johnson said the bid includes prices for partial work so the city could expand the project to add other piers or additions.
The work will include replacing all the older bulkheads at the marina, Johnson said.
“The good news here is when this is done, just about 100 percent of the bulkhead at the Fairhope docks will be less than seven years old,” he said.
The council also voted to approve a bid by Greenco Services to dredge the marina channel. The bid was $175,098.30. Johnson said the final cost to dredge the channel is expected to be less than the bid price.
He said the bid is based on the estimated cost of removing all the sediment needed to dredge the entire channel. The Fairhope Yacht Club, however, located on the south side of Fly Creek, has already dredged much of the channel near its docks.
“Because the bids were based on assuming we were doing 100 percent of the channel. Half the channel already dredged,” he said.
Johnson said the entire project is expected to cost less than $150,000.
