Blackburn Point Park project: halfway there

Although the Blackburn Point Park improvement project took several years to begin, it is now 50% complete.

The project — which includes a new boat ramp to be installed next week, a building with restrooms and vending machines, and fishing a pier — comes with a $4.5 million price tag. The initial design for the park began in 2008, however construction did not begin until April because of a $1.3 million Sarasota County budget shortfall.

The tentative completion date is March, said Anthony Bell, the project’s manager for Sarasota County.
Besides new amenities, the improvement project includes parking for 56 boat trailers. The parking lot will be made out of pervious concrete, which is also being used at the Siesta Key Beach Improvement Project. Although the material is more expensive, it allows for more parking spaces because it reduces the size of the retention pond for runoff.

The eastern section of the park, which is dedicated to the kayak launch and storage area for rowing teams, is also getting its own restroom. The county is renovating a structure already on-site, which has been previously used as the Casey Key Library and a water utilities building. Altogether, the park is about 16 acres.

For Ryan Tremblay, the project manager with Willis Smith Construction, the project has brought forth some unusual challenges.

For one, while widening and deepening the water channel in front of the boat launch, construction staff ran into piles of softball-sized rocks. The rocks were not made up of any typical Florida geology, Tremblay said. They’ve sent the rocks to the county archeologist for analyzing, but haven’t received any results. Tremblay joked that he even gave one to his mom, who is an eighth-grade science teacher. They dredged 700 cubic yards of rock from the boat launch area.

And Tremblay’s on-site office is gathering a display of glass bottles, found while cleaning up the trash and debris leftover from the days that Blackburn Point served as a commercial fishing camp.

“There’s a million unique aspects to this project,” Tremblay said.

Not everything in the project has been a struggle, though. Three thousand mangroves were slated to be planted in a mitigation section of the park to restore some of the mangrove swamp. However, after invasive species were cleared out, the mangroves already there are taking over naturally.

Building Blocks
Over the course of seven months, county staff and Willis Smith staff have run into some unique challenges and discoveries when restoring Blackburn Point Park.

• A shell midden in the corner of the main part of the park, which must be preserved.

Below: Large rocks in the water with geology not matching any natural Florida rocks. About 700 cubic yards of the large pockmarked stones were removed. The theory is that these rocks served as ballasts for sailboats.

• Railroad tracks, which at one time helped a railcar back boats in and out of the old ramp.

• Trash and debris, such as old glass bottles, from the old fishing camp that was once located at Blackburn Point.

Below: Grand trees that had to be saved from demolition — although a storm knocked one down that was already suffering from termite damage.