Improvements to the town boat ramp along the Colorado River north of Moab are working their way through the planning phase.
At this week’s Grand County Commission meeting, funding for the engineering project was approved, which comes to $64,000 — $16,000 directly coming from the county and $48,000 from a grant provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and administered through the Utah Department of Natural Resources for improving boating access. An optional topographic survey of the site would draw $6,000 from the county engineering department.
Renderings of the plan from engineering and design contractors Jones & DeMille show improvements to paving, the creation of a parking lot, the installation of a bathroom and picnic area, and increasing the length of the ramp itself, which currently becomes exposed and unusable at low water levels.
The town boat ramp, located across the river from Lion’s Park, was originally built in the 1950s and has been sporadically and informally updated and maintained since. According to the Town Boat Ramp Action Plan, the last major improvement project was in 1990 and intervening years have left the site with crumbling concrete and haphazard parking for boaters.
Planned designs for the boat ramp project can be seen at http://bit.ly/moabboatramp.
