Dredging in the Lower Connecticut River

The lower Connecticut River and Long Island Sound support a robust recreational boating industry. Along with "ecotourism", recreational boating is one of the economic engines that drives the local and regional economies. In that the Connecticut River carries a great deal of sand, silt and mud, there is always the need to dredge such material when it fills in near docks and marinas as well as the larger channels overseen by the US Coast Guard. Every year, thousands of cubic yards of material are dredged along the coast of Connecticut, enabling boats of all sizes to continue to access boating channels, fairways, marinas and docks.

This photograph shows mid-November dredging at a private residential dock located along the shores of Chester with the Goodspeed Bridge seen to the north. The red tugboat is tied to a dredge "scow" which is the waterborne "dumptruck" into which the loader dumps the dredge spoils, bucket by bucket. The bucket loader is operating atop another barge tied next to the scow. When full, the scow has to be towed out of the river into Long Island Sound where the spoils are disposed of in one of several approved offshore dredge spoil dumping sites. From Chester, the disposal trip out and back could take the better part of the day, so two scows are sometimes used to speed the work, rotating as the active dumping scow.

When dredge material is taken from more industrial waterways such as Bridgeport Harbor or the Thames River, regulatory agencies will require "capping" of the often contaminated bottom sediments with " clean" dredge material taken from other sites around the state. One impediment to the dredging of contaminated sediments is the requirement to cap with up to five times the volume of the contaminated sediment to insure that it is rendered as harmless as possible. Its often difficult to plan for access to that quantity of "clean" dredge spoils. Dredge spoils taken from the lower Connecticut River seldom require capping because the sediments are considered relatively uncontaminated in most locations.

Due to the environmental impacts of dredging, both to habitat and wildlife living in and around a dredge site, the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection and the US Army Corps of Engineers oversee the review and approval of state and federal permits for dredging proposals. Dredging is most often banned during the time that fish and other wildlife are most prone to adverse impacts of dredging - late spring, summer and early fall. That results in a dredging "window" from November to March being available to do the necessary work of keeping waterways passable for boats of all sizes.

Because the Gateway Commission's authority is tied to the zoning authority in the eight member towns along the lower river, their jurisdiction also ends at the mean high water. Although the Gateway Commission will sometimes comment on dock construction or dredging projects, Gateway members know that their authority does not extend into the water where the state and federal authorities take over. Municipalities, however, can have significant input if they have Harbor Management Commissions. Four of the eight Gateway member towns - Old Lyme, Old Saybrook, Essex and Chester - have active Harbor Management Commissions.