Oct. 9, 2001 – Progress on the Enighed Pond commercial port recently inched along when the Federal Highway Administration announced its findings that the project would have no significant environmental impact on Enighed Pond. The FHA still must sign off on the project, something Port Authority planner Darlan Brin said probably won't happen until November.
Brin now thinks that the actual construction will start by June or July of 2002. Last January, Gov. Charles W. Turnbull said he expected it to start within three months. The project has been in the works for about 30 years.
"Not doing the pond has slowed the development of this island down," St. John resident Norm Gledhill said. When the project is completed, commercial vehicles will enter the island at Enighed Pond, rather than the Creek, which will help alleviate traffic congestion in Cruz Bay.
Passenger ferries are expected to shift operations to the Creek, which now is used primarily by commercial traffic such as barges. This would take pressure off the Cruz Bay waterfront, another high-traffic area.
Gledhill faults the Port Authority for the delays. "I believe that the Port Authority does not want to see this," he said.
Brin said that work on transplanting coral from one side of the pond to the other began about a month ago. The move is one of the requirements imposed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers when it issued a permit on Dec. 28, 1999.
St. John's Coastal Zone Management Committee granted the Port Authority a one-year extension on its CZM permit for the project in June of 2000. The permit was first issued in 1989 and had been extended by the CZM committee several times before.
Brin said the contract to transplant the coral took effect before the CZM permit expired, which satisfied the permit requirements. No one on the St. John CZM committee could be reached for comment Tuesday.
The V.I. government will fund the $16 million Enighed Pond project with money from GARVEE bonds, to be repaid with Federal Highway Administration funds that the territory routinely receives.
Planning for the project began in 1971. In 1985, the Port Authority anticipated it would cost about $4 million and expected to start construction by the end of that year. However, numerous obstacles stood in its way.
After the local government and the Port Authority wrangled over ownership of the land, the Legislature decided in favor of the Port Authority. Once that was resolved, the Port Authority secured the required CZM permit, which has since been extended repeatedly. The Port Authority then had to secure the Army Corps permit, a process which took several years. That permit expires Nov. 3, 2004.
