Ashley Wong
Thursday, May 8, 2008

FORT FRANCES—The town discussed the viability of repairing, replacing, or removing the government dock at Pither’s Point during a public meeting Wednesday night at the Civic Centre.
Remedial repairs and upgrades are slated to cost $770,000 while replacing the entire dock would cost an estimated 1.5 million. Removing the dock would cost $290,000.

“I can pretty safely say, with the host of unknowns going on out there, we’re not going to spend a whack of money on the dock,” Fort Frances CAO Mark McCaig said Wednesday night.
Operations and Facilities manager Doug Brown informed the nine members of the public on hand for the meeting about the state of the dock, which originally was constructed in 1935.
“It’s broken down and when the waves hit it, you can hear it rattle against the wood, and it’s just falling apart . . . basically the life of the dock is at the end of it’s life cycle,” Brown said.
“It’s a hefty investment for basically minimal use,” noted McCaig.
“The reality today is it’s not used to the extent it was in the past,” he added. “We want people to realize that the deck [of the dock] is in ill repair.”
The dock underwent $102,000 in repairs in 1997 after it was damaged by ice.
Brown noted the problem lies in the foundation of the dock and the timber bents that have significant rot, where many of the joints no longer are touching.
“We don’t know if we really need a dock out there,” Brown said.
There’s no deadline yet for making a decision on the future of Pither’s Point dock, which remains open to pedestrian traffic and for swimming.
(Fort Frances Daily Bulletin)