Rivers Dredged to Set up Barge Ports in NY

Danielle Jackson

New York -- New York has nearly completed dredging the East and Hudson Rivers to create barge ports that will carry away most of the estimated 1.2 million tons of debris from the World Trade Center site.

By barging the debris, the city will reduce the number of trash trucks crowding roadways, tunnels and bridges in and around the city. Barges already have been used to move about one-third of the 154,000 tons cleared from the site, according to city officials.

A single barge can carry between 1,000 and 3,000 tons of steel, whereas a truck can carry between 10 and 30 tons, depending on the shape of the steel.

Already, Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island hsa been reopened to bury the debris, and two former transfer stations, a barge port on the Hudson River at 59th Street and another port on Hamilton Avenue in Red Hook, Brooklyn, are assisting with the barge effort. The dredging project creates at least two more sites that will help dispose of the debris.

The dredging project has cost approximately $1.3 million so far, with nearly 200,000 cubic yards of mud and silt dug up from two sites along the East and Hudson Rivers. The mud and silt has been dumped back into the water in a dredging disposal pit in Newark Bay.