Last Friday, September 18th, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers together with the local, state and PortMiami officials, celebrated completion of the Miami Harbor deepening and widening project .
The PortMiami’s Deep Dredge is the largest dredging project conducted in the region in the past decade, and is the first of its kind in the nation to combine federal, state and local funds in advance to get the project done.
This is the first Federal navigation project in the southeast built to a 50 feet depth to accommodate today’s shipping needs.
Miami Harbor construction brought the entrance channel depth to 52 feet, and widened the outermost portion of the entrance channel to 800 feet. The project also widened portions of the inner channel and deepened it to 50 feet. In total, five different dredges removed more than five million cubic yards of rock, limestone and sand.
Through a progressive partnership with the State of Florida, which provided funds needed to construct the project, the channel construction was completed in two years.
Miami Harbor is the first of four Eastern Seaboard ports to be deepened to accommodate the larger vessels.