Project Description
In 2023, the State Coastal Conservancy awarded the City of Berkeley a grant sum of $8.9 Millon for the Berkeley Marina improvements, consisting of maintenance dredging of the Berkeley Marina harbor and entrance plus the removal and replacement of two failing dock systems, which Dutra Constuction was awarded. The City secured a USACE permit allowing dredging of 350,000 cubic yards over a period of 10 years. Dutra Dredging began the first phase of dredging in April 2024 and has dredged 81,000 cubic yards to date.
Major Challenges
The extremely shallow conditions, paired with busy ship traffic from numerous recreational boats and more than a dozen docks, meant Dutra’s DB-24 derrick barge had limited mobility. These conditions also impacted other Dutra vessels, including scows and tugboats, which draft anywhere from three to six feet depending on their size. As such, the team was restricted digging only during high tide conditions and had to stagger its two 8-hour shifts around the presence of high tides.
Project Highlights
Working in combination with the Dutra Construction team we were able to successfully complete the first of two seasons of work in the Berkely Marina with minimal impact to the marina’s operations while removing the old D&E Docks and deeping both the channel and the marina to a minimum depth of 8 feet. One of the special conditions of the contract was a provision that a minimum of 62 percent of the “clean” dredged material was to used for beneficial reuse and transported to the Montezuma Wetlands Restoration Project, located in Solano County in the North Bay.
Project Scope
The entrance channel and marina are to be dredged to a depth of -10 feet and this season our team was able to hit a depth of -8 bringing the total cubic yards dredged to date to 81,000. This puts us in a great position to complete this project next year as we mobilize our smaller fleet into complete the dredging of the shallow interior marina.
