Efforts by the Port of Port Townsend to begin rebuilding the breakwater at the Point Hudson Marina by 2022 will hinge on the port receiving permit approval for the project in July.

Port Engineer Mike Love updated the port commission on plans to replace two jetties protecting the Point Hudson Marina during a recent board meeting. 

The port has received a $1 million windfall from the Washington State Legislature as part of an approved budget request earlier this year.

Currently, the project is hoping to permit approval by July, which would allow for construction on the northern breakwater to start September 2022 and be completed by February 2023.

Under this timeline, construction on the southern breakwater could start September 2023 and would be expected to be completed February 2024.

The aging creosote and stone in-fill breakwater is in a sorry state and has been that way for some time.

“Over time, the wood structure itself decays, there’s about a 50- to 60-year lifespan on that creosote-treated lumber,” Love said.

“There’s also some metal parts on this structure that don’t last quite as long.”

The port evaluated the breakwater extensively in 2014. The evaluation found voids within the stone infill inside of the piles. Steel cabling, tying the tops and bottoms of the piles together has also become corroded with rust and begun to fail.

“I think the report done in 2014 indicated that there’s about 70 percent failure of the internal piles and about 20 percent failure of the newer, 1960s piling,” Love said.

As a sort of stop-gap measure, the port opted to load more rock infill into the southern jetty, but the rocks that were placed inside the pilings have, in many cases, slipped away over time.

“We added additional rock, and over time that rock continues to tumble out,” Love said. “There are surveys of the surrounding area where there’s rock that has spilled out of that south jetty and sort of rolled down into a low depression further out, offshore.”

“We took a serious look at two different ideas; one is an encapsulation of the existing [breakwater] and then the second is a full removal and replacement,” he said. “One of the benefits of the complete replacement is we’ve got the benefit of the creosote removal. As we move forward in time, the environmental permitting is not getting easier.”

According to Love, the current design plan for the breakwater replacement calls for non-creosote, steel pilings to be placed vertically approximately every three feet.

The breakwater would follow a similar design as the previous breakwater, but would utilize cleaner, more eco-friendly materials.

The piles will be kept relatively close together so as to keep the stone infill static as it is battered by the waves.

“We did look at a steel mesh idea with larger spacing but … maintenance in the future [would be] greater,” Love said. “We’ve come to the conclusion of using similar spacing to what we have today, with steel pilings.”

A wooden walkway would also crown the breakwater’s above-water structure.