Peter T. Leach, Senior Editor | May 03, 2012 4:47PM EDT
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed off on its Chief of Engineer’s Report on the Jacksonville Harbor Navigational Study, clearing the way for Congress to authorize and appropriate funding for the Mile Point project, as it is known.
The project is designed to tackle a navigation hazard near the entrance to the St. Johns River that ships must pass through en route to Jacksonville Harbor.
Mile Point consists of a 5,000-foot shoreline along the northern shore of the river, three or four miles in from where the Atlantic Ocean and Intracoastal Waterway intersect. Water flow here creates a current that can spin a ship around in the channel.
As a result, pilots have restricted Panamax vessels to passing Mile Point during two four-and-a-half-hour windows every day.
Jaxport is working with the Jacksonville District of the Army Corps to design and build a $60 million jetty on the south bank of the river to “train” the outgoing tide coming up from the south, helping to intersect and neutralize the tide coming down from the north in the middle of the river channel.
“The Army Corps’ approval of the Mile Point project moves us considerably closer to ensuring we maintain the valuable port business that we have today and build on that by leaps and bounds for the future,” said Jaxport CEO Paul Anderson.
“We are now focused on working with the Corps to expedite this significant project to maximize the growth of jobs critical to our continued national economic recovery,” he said.
Contact Peter T. Leach at pleach@joc.com.