Ucluelet will be pouring some support into Whiskey Dock this year to help ease the competition for moorage space between vessels and floatplanes.
The town’s municipal council unanimously agreed to support a Whiskey Dock expansion project for up to $30,000 in 2024 to create about 160 lineal feet of additional mooring space.
“This is funded through the harbour, it’s not a tax cost. The intent is to allow the District of Ucluelet’s Whiskey Dock to become more versatile and flexible,” Abby Fortune, whose district title recently changed from Director of Parks and Recreation to Director of Community Services, explained to council during a Feb. 15 presentation.
“The additional space would not only support the commercial fishery and charter fleet, but free up existing moorage space to allow floatplanes to have more space.”
Coun. Mark Maftei noted Harbour Air had recently presented a plan to start offering four flights a day in and out of Ucluelet using the Whiskey Dock as a marine airport and wondered if the company’s proposal had fuelled the dock expansion pursuit.
“I’m wondering to what extent this expansion is motivated by the desire to accommodate floatplanes. To what extent are these things tied? If we approve this and we expand the dock, is that tacit to agreeing to the proposal that Harbour Air has put on the table?” Maftei asked.
Fortune responded that she and Harbour Master Kevin Cortes have been working on the dock expansion proposal for some time, outside of any Harbour Air considerations, adding though that the expansion would benefit all floatplanes flying in and out of the community.
“What we’re trying to do is accommodate more of our commercial vessels as well as our leisure vessels on that space,” Fortune said. “We are a national floatplane landing area…“It’s not solely driven by Harbour Air.”
Maftei also questioned whether more space would in fact be created if more space is needed to accommodate planes.
“If Harbour Air ends up running these flights, they’re going to need access to that dock throughout the whole summer. That’s typically when there’s the highest demand on dock space to begin with,” he said. I’m looking at this and I’m sort of imagining a scenario where this dock is basically getting built to shunt boats out of the way to free up the Whiskey Dock for floatplanes. It’s not necessarily creating more space for boats, it’s just moving boats to new space.”
Fortune responded the expansion would create additional access for all users.
“Currently they’re very limited with just the one finger for access for the boats. If you’ve got one boat there, it’s covering up the whole area and it’s actually currently covering up what is in fact a seaplane landing area or disembarking area,” she said. “We can shuttle the boats around a little, yes you are correct on that end, but it creates a better use of the space.”
Harbour Master Cortes reiterated the area sees floatplane traffic already and that the expansion would allow him to manage the space better.
“I’ve been trying for years to develop that area for management purposes,” he said, adding when floatplane operators contact him to advise they will be landing, he needs to find space that sometimes can’t be found.
“If I go down there and there’s a vessel tied to that dock, I have to scramble to get it moved. There’s times that I have draggers that I have to move by ropes out of the way.”
Coun. Jennifer Hoar asked whether sea lions would be a concern on the new low dock expansion.
Harbour Master Kevin Cortes said sea lions affect all the district’s docks.
“There is always a chance of getting sea lions on any flotation that’s in the harbour. I don’t think that would be a deterrent to adding dockspace. Either they would be on that dock or all piling on the one dock. I don’t see that as a deterrent,” he said.
Hoar also wondered about the busyness of the harbour during the summer months and asked about the addition of regular floatplane flights.
“I’m thinking about hake season and how many boats are coming and going from UHS in that area,” she said. “I didn’t voice it when the (Harbour Air) delegation was here, but it’s my concern about adding Harbour Air traffic to the already, in some cases, very busy summer high season traffic for boats.”
McEwen suggested floatplanes would not be spending much time tied at the dock, estimating Harbour Air’s planes would likely be moored for 20 minutes at a time.
Fortune agreed and suggested harbour uses would get used to Harbour Air’s schedules relatively quickly.
Maftei reiterated the timing of the dock expansion and Harbour Air’s proposal made the two seem linked and said he supported the dock expansion, but didn’t want that support to be linked to Harbour Air’s proposal.
“The way I see it is that this proposal to expand the dock is beneficial…It’s going to streamline the process of balancing the needs of floatplanes and commercial vessels, but I hope it doesn’t necessarily put us in a position where, if we approve this, then we have to say we’re also going to have daily flights coming in and out,” Maftei said. “I see this as beneficial, even though I don’t see the benefit of daily flights.”
McEwen noted the Whiskey Dock expansion was part of the district’s Harbour Master Plan and was not related to Harbour Air’s proposal.
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