Jack Berghel, a member of the local Village Volkswagen cycling team, and T.J. Killelea, a collegiate cyclist, ride by the Market Street Bridge.HEADLINE: Cost may sink Chattanooga boat dock proposal
THE RECAP: A discussion of a resolution to build four boat docks on the south side of the Tennessee River in Chattanooga was pulled from the City Council agenda after the mayor’s office and city council members expressed concern about the project’s cost. The boat docks, which could contain as many as 44 slips, would require $8.8 million in city money on top of a $1.8 million grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
DREW’S VIEW: Council member Ken Smith, chairman of the Public Works Committee, hit the nail on the head when he publicly doubted the economic development return from the dock project, noting, “The only time I see boats down there is during festivals.”
The boat docks are a bad business model that won’t make money for the city. The dock proposal is unpopular, too. In an online poll on the Times Free Press website, opponents of the dock project outweighed supporters by a margin of nearly 2-to-1.
If building boat docks on the riverfront was a viable idea, a private developer would do it. In the past, city leaders would happily waste taxpayers’ hard-earned money on bad ideas that weren’t economically logical (a marina, a bicycle rental scheme, a hotel, a cable and Internet company, a private plane storage and maintenance facility, and a certain blue rhino all come to mind). Hopefully the restraint and thoughtfulness being shown by Mayor Andy Berke and the members of the new Chattanooga City Council is a sign that our current city leaders aren’t as enthusiastic about frittering away tax dollars on projects that simply aren’t a priority for our city as the leaders of the past.