NATCHEZ ON THE WATERFRONT 7


There are few other topics that can conjure up as much emotion,


controversy and polarisation as dredging, and particularly what to do with the sediments that have been dredged


the materials today are cleaner than 20 years ago. This can be particularly frustrating to a facility that has striven to operate as a clean marina. Politicians often fuel the fires


of controversy by oversimplifying things (usually for political gain) by saying things like, “no-one should be dumping toxic waste into our waters”. Not only is this a gross misstatement of the facts, but it serves only to create further controversy and divide the public, and if it were true would only serve


to retain undesirable exposure regardless of how people spend time on or in the water. Recreational boating is dependent upon clean water and adequate water depths to navigate through. The shallowing of the waters


for recreational boating is in the nearshore harbours and coastlines (rivers, lakes, tidal waters). It is also the area that is most subject to disruption in major episodic storms and heavy rain storms that stir up the bottom sediments and disperse them throughout the near shore areas. It is also the same areas where we swim, fish and take part in watersports. So by not dredging in near shore areas, the environment, as well as the use of beaches and fishing, can be affected. In many areas of the US, dredged materials with contaminants have been relocated into deep holes within the waterbodies farther from shore (think of potholes in the water). If there are contaminants, the process allowed the materials to be capped with a mound of clean materials. In


fact, the Army Corps of Engineers, along with the US Environmental Protection Agency, has decades of field studies that show that the capping process was meaningful and contained those materials with contaminants. Many argue that the dredged


materials must be placed upland. To do that there has to be reasonably close-by places where the materials can be placed upland, dewatered and then removed to an acceptable landfill and/or processed. While the concept is laudable, the practicality for most developed areas is logistically infeasible due to the lack of close-by areas that can be used for unloading and dewatering. Some areas have tried to be proactive in undertaking the creation of areas for such use, but they are few and far between. The fact is that big brother/sister takes the position ‘that is not their job’. So the result is that the water depths are shallowing up. In fact, that is what is happening to many facilities, particularly in


built-up metropolitan shorelines. Many marinas are no longer viable due to the shallowing of water depths and are deciding to eliminate the marina and build condos. The result is that shorelines around the world are being lined with medium and high-rise residential complexes, blocking the scenic vistas and eliminating access into the water. There is big money in it for developers and tax revenues for municipalities, and 20 years from today one is going to ask how it could have been allowed to happen. There are others who believe that materials with contaminants may be treated or processed into ‘beneficial uses’. Yet most approaches and demonstration projects fail to achieve these goals in any reasonably economic fashion, again forcing the closing of recreational facilities. When one understands that approximately 80% of the over 10,000 marinas in the US have less than 100 boats and approximately 50% have less than 50 boats, the bottom line is that


MARINA INDUSTRY SOUTH-EAST ASIA & PACIFIC • AUGUST 2018


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