Port of Mobile to Get Stimulus Funds

A long-promised turning basin at Alabama’s Port of Mobile will receive nearly $25 million in funding from the federal stimulus package.

The project — first authorized by Congress in 1986 — has been approved for American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The proposed turning basin has long been identified as ‘critical need’ at the Port of Mobile, where vessel traffic and ship sizes have begun to outgrow the harbor’s single turning basin.

“Our port has needed the new turning basin as our business has significantly grown over the past decade,” said Jimmy Lyons, the state port authority’s director and CEO. “We have just recently landed several new services at the port that currently cannot efficiently turn in our existing basin.”

The new 1,550-foot by 870-foot turning basin represents the final phase of construction to widen and deepen the Mobile Ship Channel to a 45-foot draft.

The Mobile Harbor widening and deepening project also included 1,200-foot and 2,100-foot channel extensions to support vessel service at the Port Authority’s McDuffie Coal Terminal, the newly opened $300 million Mobile Container Terminal and the future Pinto Steel Terminal scheduled to open in December.