Watch for Park Point beach closures this summer as debris is cleaned

DULUTH – A stretch of Park Point beach will be closed and combed for debris in the coming weeks as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers cleans up after inadvertently dumping aluminum can shards and other materials along the popular public waterfront.

Portions of the beach between the Aerial Lift Bridge and the 12th Street parking lot will be off-limits in phases into July, up to several weeks longer than originally planned. The Corps is buying a tractor-driven rake that sifts the top 6 inches of sand specifically for this cleanup effort.

"They'll do that repeatedly until it's no longer necessary," said Jim Filby Williams, Duluth's director of parks, properties and libraries. "Our priority has been to see to it that the Corps cleans up those materials as quickly and as completely as is technically and practically possible."

The debris was placed on the beach last summer and fall as the Corps replenished the eroded beach with dredge material from the harbor. That project came at the behest of the city, which has lost significant Lake Superior shoreline in recent years amid high waters and powerful storms.

Additional beach nourishment is scheduled for later this summer after the cleanup with added protections to prevent more decades-old trash from the bottom of the harbor from reaching the beach.

Though the closed sections of Park Point represent a small fraction of the miles-long public beach and its numerous access points, they are the closest to the shipping canal and foot traffic over the lift bridge.

Already orange barrels have been placed to mark areas where some recently discovered nails, taconite pellets and other debris is buried — most of it deep enough that it would take a storm to bring it to the surface, officials said.

"The material was small, relative to the amount of material placed out there," said Corey Weston, the Corps' chief of construction and survey. "We aren't discounting that at all and taking that very seriously."

A smaller-scale cleanup using the mechanical sifter will target any debris that waves and wind may have pulled several miles farther south along a narrow band of shoreline, he said. Weston did not have a cost estimate for the cleanup operation, which the federal agency will cover.

He said the Corps has initiated a Section 111 study, which assesses damage attributable to dredging projects and could help identify a long-term solution for erosion along Park Point. It would take congressional approval to launch the effort, which may not come until this fall.

Brooks Johnson • 218-491-6496