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STORMPROOF STATEN ISLAND FERRIES

SCHUMER: FIVE-DAY STATEN ISLAND FERRY DISRUPTION DUE TO SANDY FLOODING WAS LONGEST IN HISTORY; ANNOUNCES PUSH FOR $2.7 MILLION IN FEDERAL FUNDS TO STORMPROOF ST. GEORGE AND WHITEHALL FERRY TERMINALS TO AVOID FUTURE SERVICE OUTAGES


Floodwaters From Hurricane Sandy Rushed Into St. George Ferry and Whitehall Terminals and Took Busiest Ferry Service In The World Offline For 5 Days


Federal Funds Would Prevent Future Flooding at St. George Terminal and Ferry Maintenance Facility By Installing Watertight Entrances; Funds Would Also Go To Whitehall Ferry Terminal in Manhattan


Schumer: 70K People Rely on SI Ferry Every Day And We Can Not Afford Another Long-Term Service Suspension Ever Again

U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer announced last week that he is pushing to secure $2.7 million in funds from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to pay for a plan to stormproof the St. George Ferry Terminal in Staten Island. This project, which would be eligible for funding through FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP) would enable the city to install various watertight entrances and enclosures for all doorways and significant water ingress points throughout the lower levels of both the St. George Ferry Terminal and the adjacent Ferry Maintenance Facility. Some of this funding would also go towards similar repairs at the Whitehall Ferry Terminal in Manhattan.

Schumer explained that this funding is necessary in order to avoid a flood-related service disruption such as the one experienced following Hurricane Sandy. As a result of never-before-seen floodwaters rushing into the St. George Terminal during the Superstorm, as well as similar storm surges at Whitehall Ferry Terminal in Manhattan, the Staten Island Ferry was out of service for five days – the longest outage in the ferry’s 108-year history. As a result of flooding in the terminals, as well as the Ferry Maintenance Facility, 350,000 passenger-trips were ultimately canceled even though the vessel fleet escaped from the storm largely unscathed.

“Hurricane Sandy stopped the busiest ferry in the world in its tracks, dragging out commutes and clogging roadways with thousands of extra cars,” said Schumer. “For a relatively small amount of money we can prevent a ferry shutdown from happening again, and it is an investment well worth making. The Staten Island Ferry is a critical lifeline for Staten Islanders, and we must do everything in our power to make sure service can withstand the next storm.”

“I applaud Senator Schumer for fighting to ensure that Staten Island Ferry service will be better protected from storms like Sandy," said Staten Island Borough President James Oddo. "Thousands of Islanders take the ferry every day, and these funds are essential to making sure that commuters can rely on ferry service to get to work. With multiple attractions coming to the North Shore waterfront, stormproofing the ferry terminals is an important investment in Staten Island’s future.”

This project, which is being supported by The City of New York, will procure and install various watertight entrances and enclosures for all doorways, garage door, vent openings, and other significant water ingress points throughout the lower levels of the St. George Ferry Terminal, Ferry Maintenance Facility, and Whitehall Ferry Terminal. This will mitigate and prevent flooding of operational, work and office spaces throughout the facilities, thus ensuring that critical infrastructure is resilient and impervious to future flooding. This is a comprehensive project that seeks to protect against any future flooding based on the 100-year flood levels.

This project will likely use a mixture of heavy-duty watertight doors with pneumatic or mechanical seals, hinged flood gates with pneumatic seals, and stackable flood barriers to provide a flexible, durable, and cost effective combination of defenses to prevent flooding to critical equipment and operating areas to best mitigate this flooding hazard. Due to the nature of the watertight enclosures, they can be retrofitted onto existing entryway infrastructure, requiring no excavation or earth moving activities. After fabrication, the enclosures will be directly installed over each identified entryway.

This project is currently in the project development phase and project scoping has identified 57 openings in the St. George Ferry Terminal, 9 openings at the Ferry Maintenance Facility, and 63 openings at the Whitehall Ferry Terminal that will be treated with the installation of watertight enclosure protection for this project. It is estimated to take 80 weeks to complete once underway.

On October 29, 2012, Hurricane Sandy inundated the terminals and facilities of the Staten Island Ferry in Staten Island and Manhattan with five-feet of flooding seawater. Significant damage was incurred throughout all lower levels of the Whitehall Ferry Terminal, St. George Ferry Terminal, and Ferry Maintenance Facility. These flood waters destroyed terminal operating equipment for ferry operation; electrical, mechanical and HVAC systems for terminal and facilities; facility security and protection systems, office spaces and work areas; tools, parts, material and stockpiled inventory for ferry operation and maintenance; vehicles and garages, and doors and entryways. In total, according to FEMA and other federal agencies, the Staten Island Ferry sustained more than $15 million, including more than $9 million at the St. George Terminal, the Ferry Maintenance Facility and the Whitehall Terminal.

FEMA’s hazard mitigation grant program provides additional funding under Section 406 of the Stafford Act, the federal disaster law that supplies aid to states and localities to implement long-term resiliency measures after a major disaster. The purpose of these grants is to reduce the loss of life and property due to natural disasters and to enable mitigation measures to be implemented during the immediate recovery from a disaster. Normally, without these grants, FEMA will only provide enough funds for a locality to rebuild using the same specifications as the original structure.

The Staten Island Ferry provides 22 million people a year (70,000 passengers a day, not including weekend days) with ferry service between St. George on Staten Island and Whitehall Street in lower Manhattan. The ferry is the only non-vehicular mode of transportation between Staten Island and Manhattan. NYC Department of Transportation operates and maintains the nine-vessel fleet as well as the St. George Ferry Terminal on Staten Island, Whitehall Ferry Terminal in Manhattan, the City Island and Hart Island Facilities, The Battery Maritime Building and all floating dock building equipment.

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