Masonville Marine Terminal: Port Development, Dredged Material Management, Environmental Restoration, and Mitigation

The Masonville Marine Terminal (MMT) is a 178 acre site that the Maryland Port Administration (MPA) purchased in 1978, with the intent to use this property for dredged material disposal and then develop it into a container terminal. This paper serves to describe the actions that the MPA has undertaken since acquiring the property, which includes the initial pavement of 54 acres on relatively stable ground; followed by stabilization and pavement of the existing dredged material placement area; cleanup and removal of hazardous waste associated with derelict vessel abandonment; planning, development, design and construction oversight of a new 130 acre Dredged Material Containment Facility (DMCF) to be constructed in the Patapsco River; and associated environmental mitigation design and construction to offset filling open water. The new DMCF will be used to meet the goals of the State of Maryland's Dredged Material Management Plan (DMMP) for the Port of Baltimore, and is planned to receive an annual capacity of 0.5 to 1.0 million cubic yards (MCY) of material dredged from the Baltimore Harbor channels. Total capacity is planned to be 16 MCY over an operational life of 20 years. Following placement of the dredged material, the DMCF will also be developed into a port facility. Several environmental and geotechnical issues have been important in this project: 1) dredging of unsuitable material and placement at Hart-Miller Island DMCF; 2) dredging of sand and gravel for a different MPA terminal shipping channel and placement of the material at Masonville as a foundation for the sand dikes; 3) design and construction of new storm drain systems to reroute storm water around the DMCF; 3) design and construction of a new 48 inch diameter potable water line around the DMCF; 4) coastal engineering evaluation to design the dike sections and armor stone slope protection; 5) hydrodynamic modeling to evaluate environmental impacts from the new DMCF; 6) structural and geotechnical engineering design and construction of a 1200 ft long cofferdam as one section of the containment facility dike; 7) environmental restoration design and construction as mitigation for the project that includes tidal wetlands, non-tidal wetlands, reef creation, and upland habitat debris removal and reforestation.