Community

Cranes crowd the Harbor for work on Homeport and other projects

Once again, a lofty crane punctuates the Gig Harbor shoreline as workers for Redside Construction are in the early stages of preparing the Ancich Park site for a new Commercial Fishing Homeport.

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Work on the the project, decades in the making, began last week.

Workers from the Bainbridge Island-based company told GHN that initial steps include removing old piers and their pilings. On Monday, Sept. 21, trucks brought in bulky debris boxes to carry the discards away.

At Ancich Park this week, workers took the first step toward contruction of a new Commerical Fishing Homeport. Photo by Chapin Day

Mitigation projects

Oddly enough, the job they were doing directly relates to why a chunky, Redside-owned excavator blocked part of a city parking lot adjacent to The Tides restaurant blocks away.

Here’s the reason, as explained by city Public Works Senior Engineer and Project Manager George Hilen.

Both the Ancich Park site preparation and the parking lot job are wrapped into the City Council-approved $3.6 million Homeport contract. Each is an environmental mitigation measure agreed to during negotiations leading to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service approving the Homeport project.

At Anich, removal of an old asphalt dock and its chemically coated pilings will make surrounding waters more fish-friendly.

A crane removes a creosote-soaked piling near Ancich Park. Photo by Chapin Day

Beneath the parking lot, a 36-inch city storm drain has for years spewed torrents directly into the harbor. That foiled earlier efforts to protect the shoreline from their erosive force. A new structural pile of rocks — piled 4 feet deep, 12 feet wide and extending at least 16 feet away from the drain — will disperse the flow, protecting sea life while minimizing erosion.

Sources involved told us that the parking lot may return to normal within a week.  The mitigation work at Ancich Park could continue into next week.

Improving a stormwater outfall near the Tides Tavern is part of the mitigation for construction of a new Commercial Fishing Homeport. Photo by Chapin Day

Hilen told GHN that installing elements of the new Homeport may not begin until January.

The Homeport property is directly adjacent to a similar private marina construction that drew spectators recently, as did this week’s activities. Bystanders are all kept safely away from the crane’s hefty loads.

Private dock work, too

The Quigg Brothers crane Skookum, floating star of the private dock installation show earlier this month, returned to Gig Harbor recently. Its first job was near the Boat Barn and Seven Seas Brewery. Then, on Sept. 22, it helped install new pilings at a private dock near the harbor entrance, propelled this time by the tug Mary Margaret.

The pair and their crews finished job and were gone by mid-afternoon.

Moored at the dock they strengthened is the fishing vessel Alexandra J, owned and operated by Alex James and Zack Worrell of Harbor Fish Company, Inc.

Work on a private dock also continued this week as cranes filled the harbor. Photo by Chapin Day