Ayear into Maryland's artificial reef-building program and, on the surface, there's nothing to show for it.
That's the way it is with projects that are on the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay.
You can't see it, like bay grasses. Or hear it, like the new "smart" buoy at the mouth of the Patapsco River that passes along water quality measurements and history and cultural nuggets to your cell phone and home computer. Or smell it, like wildflower plantings in the Interstate 95 median.
But MARI, as the Maryland Artificial Reef Initiative is called, is making progress. You can tell by visiting the construction site of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge project. Piles of material that used to be the old span over the Potomac River outside of Washington are diminishing. Tens of thousands of tons of it.
Barges are taking debris downstream and out into the bay, where it is being used to build fresh habitats for fish and other critters at Point No Point, a football field-sized spot just off St. Mary's County.
Since the first 600 tons were dumped Aug. 4 of last year, the program has added almost 10,000 tons. All told, the reef-building project has spent $266,778.
A video shot last winter shows critters have already moved in, and fishermen say the bite has improved.
Now, MARI is ready to tackle other bay spots such as Tangier Sound on the Eastern Shore, which received 1,133 tons July 9, and Cedar Point near Solomons, which is slated to get its first load sometime next week.
The Department of Natural Resources has also initiated the permit process to build a reef near a site known as "The Gooses," at the mouth of the Choptank River. The Gooses, which could attract 100 boats in its heyday, gradually diminished in effectiveness as silt covered the hard bottom.
"We've got an enormous amount of material," says Mike Baker, environmental manager for the Wilson Bridge project. "We're about to ramp up big time."
The process will accelerate as construction crews begin removing the old second span that carried the Capital Beltway's inner loop. Baker estimates as many as four barges carrying 1,000 tons each will move down the river this week, with an average of two loads following each week through mid-February.
Reef building isn't new, but techniques have improved. Maryland built 20 artificial bay reefs before funding dried up in the mid-1990s. Ten reefs were built near Ocean City.
Some bay sites, built without the input of fishermen familiar with local waters, were flops. That gave critics an opening to harp about this project.
Larry Simns, president of the Maryland Watermen's Association, has long criticized reef programs as allowing debris dumping under the guise of conservation. Other watermen question the cleanliness of construction material.
This time, by incorporating local knowledge and sonar scanning, state officials say they hope to get it right.
But that's only part of the process. Securing large amounts of material so close to the Chesapeake Bay is as rare as a dope-free Tour de France.
Demolition of the old Wilson Bridge provided an opportunity to build, on a very large scale, artificial reefs in prime fishing habitat.
With that settled came the question of paying the $20 to $30 per ton to move the bridge slabs and columns downstream.
MARI, a partnership of 30 bay interests, was established last summer as a fund-raising program administered by Maryland Coastal Conservation Association. Nancy Petersen, a philanthropist who lives in southern Anne Arundel County, gave the first contribution of $100,000, with BP and Shell oil companies and Honeywell International adding to the pot.
The nonprofit has raised nearly $1 million, half of it through a state bond approved by the legislature last session.
A meeting last week at DNR headquarters in Annapolis to discuss short-term goals brought out an impressive array of recreational anglers, charter-boat captains, scientists, foundations and corporations. Geographically, the attendees represented both sides of the bay, both ends of the bay and Ocean City.
The consensus was to continue to place material at Point No Point until the reef is 10 feet tall (it's approaching that at its end points but is only half that high in the middle), continue sending barges to Tangier and Cedar Point and, if the permit is approved this fall, place 10,000 tons at The Gooses.
The group also discussed spending $250,000 to drop hundreds of subway cars off Ocean City to create habitats.
Apparently opposition to the idea isn't what it once was.
In 2001, Ocean City officials cited pollution concerns when they canceled a contract that would have allowed the New York City Transit Authority to dump as many as 1,300 subway cars in the Atlantic Ocean to form an artificial reef.
The locals looked pretty foolish after federal environmental officials said the fears were unfounded, and the cars were instead dumped 19 miles off the Delaware shore.
"There are people who don't like these things. They don't want any more material," acknowledges Marty Gary, DNR's point man on the project. "But we think we are building reefs that are showcases, and we're hoping critics come around."
candy.thomson@baltsun.com
Building reefs in the bay
Since Aug. 4, 2006, the Maryland Artificial Reef Initiative has spent $266,778 dumping debris into the Chesapeake to build habitats.
Date Amount Cost Location Aug. 4, 2006 600 tons $38,000 Point No Point Aug. 24, 2006 2,600 tons $52,000 Point No Point Sept. 25, 2006 1,840 tons $36,800 Point No Point Dec. 7, 2006 1,620 tons $32,400 Point No Point Jan. 24, 2007 350 tons $7,000 Point No Point April 20, 2007 124 tons $2,480 Point No Point April 20, 2007 1,155 tons $25,987 Point No Point May 22, 2007 1,020 tons $22,950 Point No Point June 21, 2007 775 tons $17,437 Point No Point July 9, 2007 1,133 tons $31,724 Tangier