Town of Huntington pays $78K to demolish six-year-old docks

Questions about the future of the Woodbine Marina continue as the Town of Huntington (TOH) spends $78,000 to demolish what’s left of the six-year-old docks. The TOH will also begin to repair the bulkhead, which serves as a retaining wall.

In 2011, the TOH hired engineering company L.K. McLean Associates and dock manufacturer Bellingham Marine to design and build new docks for the town-owned marina. After spending $1.8 million, the 46-slip structure was complete, but many people, including Northport Village Mayor Damon McMullen, were skeptical that the design choices would allow the docks to withstand the harsh winter conditions and swelling that commonly occur in the harbor. After the marina’s opening in 2014, it almost immediately started falling apart and the TOH continues to pay for the debacle to this day, first with dock repair work and now with demolition.

Currently, the TOH is suing both L.K. McLean Associates and Bellingham Marine for damages, calling for more than $1 million from each party. When asked about the future of the marina, Deputy Supervisor Councilman Ed Smyth told the Journal, “We're exploring all options on the future use of the Woodbine Marina site and we look forward to working with the Village of Northport, seeking their input for an appropriate use, however there have been no definitive plans adopted as of yet; the bulkhead replacement has finally been approved after some of my Town Board colleagues rejected it earlier in the year, which is a necessary step in any future plans for the site. In the meantime, the Town’s preparations for the Village of Northport's FLUPSY oyster farm are complete, which will help promote clean water.”

In the TOH 2021 Tentative Budget, removing and disposing of the destroyed docks at Woodbine Marina is listed as a goal, as is creating a “waterfront center” at the local eyesore. But there seems to be no plan in place to make this a reality any time soon.

At the June 15 Northport Village Board of Trustees meeting, Trustee Dave Weber explained, “We are going to capture two slips down there, before they demolish everything, and a gangway. And now, from this point on, the Village is going to be responsible for those docks.” Trustee Weber mentioned that there’s a chance these docks will break up like the rest of them, but for now the Village will be keeping the FLUPSYs (Floating Upweller Systems that are used to grow oysters), a pump-out boat and police boat there.

At the same meeting, Mayor McMullen said the Village “wanted to take it over, but they [the TOH] wanted us to pay an enormous fee,” adding that the Village wouldn’t pay such a fee for “a wreck.” Currently, many Northport residents and visitors are using the marina lot for parking, but once the bulkhead repair takes place, that may change. The mayor noted that the Village tried to take over the parking lot, but the TOH wouldn’t agree. “For years, we’ve been trying to get them to rebuild that bathroom facility, to make it a family bathroom,” he added. “We even said that we’d have our crews maintain it and clean it, the way we clean our other bathrooms. But we couldn’t get them to do that.”

While the Woodbine Marina won’t be functioning as it should for quite some time, the docks will be used throughout the summer months to host the local FLUPSY program, which is meant to reduce nitrogen in our harbor.