The Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority (TLCPA) has partnered with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources to reactivate Toledo’s dredge placement confined disposal facility (CDF), known as Facility 3, at the mouth of the Maumee River. Since 2018, in anticipation of Ohio’s ban on the practice of open lake placement of dredge material that later became state law in July 2020, TLCPA and the state agencies began collaborating to modify Facility 3 to accommodate the placement of dredge material from the Federal Shipping Channel and the approaches and berths of Toledo’s thirteen active marine terminals. Each year, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredges between 600,000 and 1,100,000 cubic yards of material from Toledo’s federal channel to maintain safe navigation. The Port of Toledo supports 8,000 jobs and generates over $900 million annually in economic activity. Maritime shipping in Toledo produces $183 million in federal, state, and local tax revenue and supplies over $708M in personal income and local consumption expenditures each year.
Figure 1, Facility 3
Using $4.7 million in Healthy Lake Erie Grant Funding and some local funding, approximately 4.1 million cubic yards of dredging disposal capacity were created in Management Unit 1 of Facility 3 between 2018 and 2020. Additional work was completed to build capacity in Management Unit 2 with this funding. Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has awarded additional grant funding to the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority to further expand the capacity of Facility 3 so it can continue to receive all Toledo Harbor dredged material through 2040.*
This project is financed through a federal STATE AND LOCAL FISCAL RECOVERY FUND (SLFRF) Grant made available by the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to and through the State of Ohio.
The project funding is provided to TLCPA from Ohio's Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds through a financial assistance grant agreement with the Ohio EPA.
Anticipated work completed under the scope of this project will include:
- Using dredged material excavated from within the areas of the CDF for dike wall construction.
- Completion of the Management Unit 2 containment dike to create an additional 4.1 million cubic yards of containment volume in an effective containment area of approximately 105 acres.
- Converting the former Ash Disposal Area to an active dredge material management unit creating approximately 1.4 million cubic yards of capacity.
- Increasing the capacity of the Banana to provide 500,000 additional cubic yards of capacity for dredge material placement.
These improvements collectively will provide sufficient space to accommodate over 9.6 million cubic yards, sufficient for disposal of approximately 13.2 million cubic yards of placed material after placement and compaction extending the useful life of the facility to 2040.
The Port of Toledo supports 8,000 jobs and generates over $900 million annually in economic activity. Maritime shipping in Toledo produces $183 million in federal, state, and local tax revenue and supplies over $708M in personal income and local consumption expenditures each year.
*The contents and views, including any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations, contained in this product or publication are those of the authors and have not been subject to any Ohio Environmental Protection Agency peer or administrative review and may not necessarily reflect the views of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and no official endorsement should be inferred.
