End in sight for breakwater work

Port Washington’s longtime breakwater improvement program is scheduled to be completed next year now that the Common Council has approved a contract to rebuild the walkway on the far east end of the structure.

With little comment and acting on a recommendation from the Board of Public Works, aldermen on Tuesday awarded a $1.2 million contract for the work to Michels Corp. of Brownsville. “This is the last piece of the walkway that has not been improved leading to the lighthouse,” Public Works Director Rob Vanden Noven told the Public Works Board last week.

The city has made a concerted effort to repair the breakwater for the past seven years, lobbying federal officials for funding and hiring a consultant to help find grants to pay for much of the work.

All that’s left of the project is replacement of the walkway on the roughly 1,000 feet of the structure directly west of the lighthouse.

Michels will remove the “loose, delaminated, broken concrete” in that area, anchor steel plating to the sides of the structure, install a new concrete base and finish the walkway with new concrete panels, Vanden Noven said.

The company, which submitted the lowest of four bids for the project, offered a $260,000 reduction in its initial bid of almost $1.5 million to substitute poured-in place concrete panels for the precast panels called for in the bidding documents, Vanden Noven said.

The bid didn’t call for poured-in-place panels because it was believed that would be difficult and costly because a barge with a concrete plant would need to be brought in, he said.

But Michels said it can pump concrete from the shore, resulting in the savings, Vanden Noven said.

The city’s breakwater consultants, Foth Infrastructure and Environment, recommended accepting the substitution, he said.

Vanden Noven said the city has $750,000 in the budget for the work, a sum supplemented by a $550,000 grant.

Michel’s bid will “afford us some contingencies,” he added.

“They hope to begin working as soon as possible,” Vanden Noven said.

The contract calls for the work to be completed by June 30, 2021.