Located within the Lake Mead National Recreation Area in Bullhead City, Arizona lies Katherine Landing, a recreational water sports oasis on Lake Mohave. Starting last fall, Bellingham Marine began the upgrade of one section of the marina from a steel and wood dock system, which is common among lake marinas, to a state-of-the-art Unifloat® concrete system, which will provide a longer lifespan and added stability.
The dock replacement consists of a 659-foot long concrete Unifloat® mainwalk with (27) 26-foot-long monolithic rounded-end concrete fingers, two of which are 5-foot-wide ADA fingers, and an 80’ aluminum ADA gangway. In addition to the Unifloat® mainwalk and finger replacement, a key feature of this project is the replacement of the existing fuel dock and building floating platform with a new concrete matchcast post-tensioned system consisting of a 36’ x 64’matchcast building platform with three 8’ x 32’ matchcast fingers. The concrete floats are cast together to eliminate gaps, and then post-tensioned, creating a stable surface that acts as one solid unit increasing the live load and deadload capacity, ideal for supporting a bigger, better office facility, and extending the useful life of the dock. Not only did Bellingham Marine supply and install the floating platform, but they also supplied and installed the prefabricated metal office building.
As a turnkey design-build contractor, Bellingham Marine designed and built the dock system, designed and installed the electrical, potable water, and fire suppression systems, and designed and installed a cable/winch underwater anchoring system, which allows the marina operators to adjust the marina placement depending on the approximately 14-20 foot water level fluctuations of Lake Mohave.
Since this upgrade covers just a portion of the marina, a unique task was tying in the new concrete dock system to the existing steel and wood dock system. While challenging, BMI’s experience over the course of many projects allowed the team to successfully combine and create a smooth transition between the two dock systems.
Construction is currently in the final stages, and is expected to be completed in April 2023.
