Next Up for Bayside Dredging: Glen Cove and Snug Harbor

It's been a common sight this year: boats lying in the mud at low tide in the two lagoons on either side of the Ninth Street Bridge.

But Snug Harbor and Glen Cove may see deeper water next year if City Council approves funding for continued dredging of Ocean City's bayside lagoons, which are filled with enough sediment to make them impassable to boat traffic at low tide.

A project to dredge the lagoons and channels between 15th and 34th streets will be complete by the end of the year. The dredging work could continue with Glen Cove (between 10th and 11th streets) and Snug Harbor (between Eighth and Ninth streets) in 2013.

A new "Confined Disposal Facility" (CDF) — a place to put the dredge spoils — will be ready this spring, according to Ocean City Business Administrator Mike Dattilo. The current project between 15th and 34th streets will fill an existing spoils site in the marshes near 34th Street. The new CDF will be along the Route 52 causeway.

The city has a permit that would allow a June 1, 2013 start for Glen Cove and/or Snug Harbor dredging, according to Dattilo.

Mayor Jay Gillian's administration included $250,000 for the 2013 dredging of the two lagoons in a five-year capital plan released earlier in December. But individual appropriations within the plan must be approved by City Council.

Work across the bay from the two lagoons that is continuing this month is not related to the new spoils site. Crews working on Route 52 reconstruction are restoring wetlands at a staging area for the massive project.