Deepwater Horizon OilSpill Trajectory Link

Deepwater Horizon OilSpill Trajectory Link Very Interesting

LinK: http://ocg6.marine.usf.edu/~liu/Drifters/latest_roms.htm

EIS | Foley Land Cut | Gulf Intracoastal Waterway | Gulf Shores & Orange Beach, AL

EIS | Foley Land Cut | Gulf Intracoastal Waterway | Gulf Shores & Orange Beach, AL: "Comment Period Closed
—January 23, 2010"

This EIS is being prepared to assess potential impacts associated with mixed-use waterfront development planned along the Foley Land Cut portion of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway in southern Baldwin County, Alabama. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Mobile District, will use this EIS in making permitting decisions under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act, Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act, and NEPA. The EIS is a complete evaluation of the positive and negative effects, including the secondary and cumulative effects associated with development along the shoreline. The EIS analyzed the following major issues: hydrologic and hydraulic regimes, threatened and endangered species, essential fish habitat and other marine habitat, air quality, cultural resources, wastewater treatment capacities and discharges, drainage discharges, transportation systems, waterway capacity, hurricane evacuation, and socioeconomic impacts.

The EIS evaluated a range of alternatives to the proposed action, including the no action alternative. The no action alternative represents a continuation of current permitting activity, by the Corps. Information obtained following the public scoping meeting were considered in finalizing the array of alternatives evaluated in the EIS and included alternative methods of issuing permits, as appropriate.

The Hangout Beach Music and Arts Festival Announces 2010 Lineup Featuring John Legend, Trey Anastasio and TAB

Feb 18, 2010
The Hangout Beach Music and Arts Festival Announces 2010 Lineup Featuring John Legend, Trey Anastasio and TAB
Zac Brown Band, Alison Krauss and Union Station Featuring Jerry Douglas, The Black Crowes, The Flaming Lips, Ben Harper And Relentless7

GULF SHORES, Ala., Feb. 18 -- The Hangout Beach Music and Arts Festival announces the lineup for its inaugural year including performances from Trey Anastasio and TAB, Zac Brown Band, John Legend, Ray LaMontagne, Ben Harper and Relentless7, The Flaming Lips, and Alison Krauss and Union Station Featuring Jerry Douglas. The three-day festival is scheduled for May 14 - 16 and will feature musical entertainment directly on the sandy white beaches of Gulf Shores, Ala. The Hangout is the first major music festival of the summer festival season. A confirmed lineup is listed below with more bands to be announced in the coming weeks.

"Watching this caliber of performers directly on the beach will truly be a unique experience. There's just nothing like it," said A.J. Niland, of HUKA Entertainment. "This will be one of the biggest beach parties this area has ever seen."

With performances taking place on four stages including two main stages on the beach, the festival hopes to bring the Gulf Coast into the national music scene. In addition, festival organizers have other activities still to be announced. Attendance will be limited to 35,000 people per day.

Festival tickets are available online at hangoutmusicfest.com as well as at The Hangout and Surf Style stores along the central Gulf Coast. Ticket prices are $159 for a three-day pass and limited $82 day passes will be available after the schedule is announced in the weeks to come. VIP ticket packages and travel packages start at $500 and are available online or by phone at 1-888-512-SHOW 1-888-512-SHOW.

There is an assortment of lodging options surrounding the festival including traditional hotels, beach-front condos and camping at the local state park. Visit hangoutmusicfest.com for more information.

WHEN: MAY 14 - MAY 16
WHERE: 101 EAST BEACH BOULEVARD IN GULF SHORES, ALA.
(THE SOUTHERN END OF AL-Hwy 59)
PRICES: $159 THREE-DAY PASS / LIMITED $82 DAY PASSES / VIP TICKET
AND TRAVEL
PACKAGES AVAILABLE
WEB SITE: hangoutmusicfest.com

CONFIRMED ARTISTS: Trey Anastasio and TAB, Zac Brown Band, John Legend, Ben Harper and Relentless7, The Black Crowes, Alison Krauss and Union Station featuring Jerry Douglas, Gov't Mule, The Flaming Lips, Ray LaMontagne, Michael Franti and Spearhead, Rodrigo Y Gabriela, Funky Meters, Blind Boys of Alabama, Matisyahu, Girl Talk, Guster, Brett Dennen, Keller Williams, Jerry Jeff Walker, North Mississippi All-stars, ALO, The Whigs, Ozomatli, OK GO, Orianthi, Davy Knowles & Back Door Slam, Pnuma Trio, Black Joe Lewis and the Honey Bears, Toubab Krewe, Mat Hires, A.A. Bondy, Rachel Goodrich, Moon Taxi, El Cantador, Kristy Lee, Roman Street

For more information, please visit hangoutmusicfest.com.


Source: The Hangout Beach Music and Arts Festival

Nonprofit eyes Orange Beach for arts facility

Originally Published by the Mobile Press Register

Link: http://www.al.com/news/press-register/baldwin.ssf?/base/news/125136456919590.xml&coll=3

Beach CITE Studios had earlier agreed to build education center in Gulf Shores

Thursday, August 27, 2009

By RYAN DEZEMBER
Staff Reporter

ORANGE BEACH — A nonprofit that earlier this summer struck a deal to build and operate a 6,700-square-foot art education center on city property in Gulf Shores has backed out of that deal and instead proposed putting its facility in the next city over.

Beach CITE Studios Inc. struck a 99-year, $1-a-year lease agreement with the Gulf Shores City Council in February. Its leadership said in June that it expected to open its art center at the corner of West 19th Avenue and West Second Street early next year but that deal fell apart.

As the nonprofit sought approval for its building designs this summer, Gulf Shores officials sought to develop the public space with green building techniques, but Beach CITE Studios representatives said adding things like landscaped stormwater retention basins and a permeable parking lot would price the project out of their budget.

"At the end of the day we just had a different vision," said Jim Coughlin, the nonprofit's executive director. "We were virtually devastated that didn't work out."

About a month ago, the nonprofit approached Orange Beach leaders about building their facility on municipal property along Canal Road just south of the city's Arts Center and The Hot Shop, a public glass-blowing studio that opened this month.

Mayor Tony Kennon said that the nonprofit would build and operate the studio on public land at no cost and that there would be no city money involved.

Should the arrangement fail after the facility is built, Orange Beach would get to keep the structure, he said.

Beach CITE Studios — CITE stands for community interactive teaching experience — was founded last October as a 501(c)3 organization by area residents Dan and Linda Scott and Drew Osika. A donation from the Gulf Shores-based Camille Schroeder Charitable Foundation, which Coughlin also runs, is paying for construction of the facility and its initial operating funds, but the organization has said it plans further fundraising.

Coughlin said the building proposed for Orange Beach is virtually the same as the one that had been planned in Gulf Shores: "There will be a culinary kitchen, dance studio, music room, three or four different rooms for painting and things of that nature, a creative writing lab.

"We're trying to reach out to a variety of arts."

Coughlin has said he envisions the facility offering both private lessons and group instruction in several disciplines. During the day the focus would be on programs for preschool and home-schooled students and senior citizens. After-school, evening and summer programs are also anticipated, along with recitals, showings and other events.

During a Tuesday work session, each member of Orange Beach's City Council, Kennon and numerous residents voiced support for bringing the project to Orange Beach. Councilwoman Pattisue Carranza, however, said she'd prefer it be built behind the city's Adult Activity Center, on the Wolf Bay waterfront, leaving the area in front of the Arts Center available for festivals and other special events.

"They spent a lot of time exploring options in Gulf Shores and they came to us ... just over a month ago," Carranza said. "I don't want to be told this is the only place it can be; there are other options."

Other elected officials disagreed. They cited the added cost of filling in wetlands and building up a foundation at the waterfront site, the potential need for that space for a library expansion, and the desire to put all the art buildings in one spot as reasons they preferred the Arts Center parcel.

"After looking at the sites," said Councilwoman Joni Blalock, "I believe this is the best place for it."

Kennon said it was Coughlin's "prerogative to tell us this is the only option because it's his money."

The mayor's informal tally of the council members indicated that they would consider the proposal to build it near the Arts Center at the panel's Tuesday meeting.

Company seeks to mothball Gulf Shores landfill

Originally Published by the Mobile Press Register

Link: http://www.al.com/news/press-register/baldwin.ssf?/base/news/1247044556323330.xml&coll=3


Emerald Waste Service seeks to lease struggling county facility, reserve it for next storm cleanup

Wednesday, July 08, 2009
By RYAN DEZEMBER
Staff Reporter
GULF SHORES — With space dwindling at its construction and demolition debris landfill off Ala. 59, Emerald Waste Services has proposed mothballing the Landward Drive facility and instead leasing Baldwin County's struggling Eastfork Landfill in the Elberta area, according to city and county officials.

The Freeport, Fla.-based waste company has asked Gulf Shores to support its efforts to take over operations at the county landfill and in exchange has offered to reserve the Landward Drive landfill's remaining capacity for a post-hurricane cleanup.

Gulf Shores Public Works Director Mark Acreman said Monday that Emerald Waste Services has estimated that the landfill, which sits across Ala. 59 from Pelican Place at Craft Farms, has room left for about two years of typical construction and demolition debris or one major storm cleanup.
Gulf Shores currently takes its C&D waste, anything from vegetative debris to the remains of buildings, to the facility, but will have to switch to Baldwin County's Magnolia Landfill if the proposal comes to fruition. Although Gulf Shores would spend more in fuel and man-hours to haul waste to Magnolia Landfill, which is southwest of Summerdale, the city would ultimately see savings because of reduced tipping fees at the county facility, Acreman said.

Gulf Shores might further reduce its waste disposal costs through a vegetative debris recycling program it is developing with the owners of a Mobile County paper mill, Acreman said.

Under that plan, the city would take tree limbs and other vegetative trash to the Landward Drive landfill where the paper company would have it collected and hauled to Mobile where it would be burned as fuel for the factory, Acreman said. While the city would pay a fee in that arrangement, it would be far less than what it costs to dump the debris in a landfill, the public works director said.

"If this pilot program can get off the ground we may see substantial savings," Acreman told elected officials during a City Council work session on Monday. "That would be something that we think we can maintain in perpetuity if it's a good deal for everyone involved."

Baldwin County Solid Waste Director Jim Ransom told council members that he and Emerald Waste Services wanted a letter from the council supporting the plan before the Baldwin County Commission is approached with a formal proposal to lease Eastfork to the private company.

Located northeast of Elberta on C.C. Road, the Eastfork, which only accepts construction and demolition debris, was originally opened in the aftermath of Hurricane Ivan.

"It did really well and then we shut it down," Ransom said.

With vast residential growth forecast for easternmost Baldwin County, the 115-acre facili ty was reopened in March 2007.

"Of course everything sort of went south after that, so it's losing us money right now," Ransom said.

In the first eight months after it was reopened, county officials estimated that Eastfork lost $100,000. At the time, the landfill was receiving only about a quarter of the 100 tons of debris it needed each day to break even.

Leasing the facility to Emer ald Waste Services and closing the northern Gulf Shores landfill would not only stanch the county's losses, it could eliminate the private company's taxpayer-funded competition for debris in south Baldwin County, Ransom said.

The plan could also save Gulf Shores money during its next hurricane cleanup by guaranteeing the city a very close place to pitch all its debris, Acreman said.

"We think it's a good idea for all involved and you don't see that often," Ransom said.

Orange Beach Sewer plant land swap still not final

Originally Published by the Mobile Press Register

Link: http://www.al.com/news/press-register/baldwin.ssf?/base/news/1242292584318040.xml&coll=3

Thursday, May 14, 2009

By RYAN DEZEMBER

Staff Reporter

ORANGE BEACH — Though the city's new $24 million wastewater treatment plant is about half complete, municipal officials have learned recently that problems remain with the land swap that provided the property upon which the facility is being built.

Ironing out details of the swap with the state delayed construction by nearly 18 months. And while the latest snag won't stall the already-started project, it will require the city to deed about 20 wooded acres worth $198,100 to the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to satisfy federal regulators.

Elected officials, who were briefed on the matter during a City Council work session Tuesday, expressed no hesitation about giving the state the land, a slender piece southwest of City Hall. The council is scheduled to consider deeding the property to the state at its Tuesday meeting.

Mayor Tony Kennon said that with the original land swap, "the state essentially came to our res cue." The new plant will double the city's treatment capacity when it opens, most likely in spring.

To build the new plant, the city needed about 40 acres and wanted it south of Canal Road, where the odor from the existing facility had long greeted motorists upon their arrival to the city.

The only suitable land, city officials determined, was state-owned property south of the present facility. At the time, Orange Beach officials offered to trade land the city owned south of City Hall for

40 acres at the northern edge of Gulf State Park.

Greg Lein, assistant director of the Conservation Department's State Lands division, said the state agreed because "the city was under what was described as a public health crisis" in terms of the development pressure being put on its sewage treatment plant.

In March 2006, the state agreed to trade the 40 acres west of the city's Sportsplex for 48 acres of maritime forest along the city's Backcountry Trail.

That deal sent both tracts back to their previous owners.

Five years earlier the city traded 588 acres, including the sewer plant's 40, to the state in exchange for 204 acres south of City Hall.

It also piqued federal regulators, who noticed that in the 2001 swap, the state neglected to replace in a grant program some 240 acres of the land it was giving up.

The grant, dating back to the 1970s, was intended to finance state acquisition of land that would be set aside for public recreation and wildlife habitat.

State officials believed they had a solution, proposing to place deed restrictions on land they recently bought along the Perdido River to satisfy federal regulators. But the Perdido River property was appraised for only $2.2 million and the 240 acres were valued at $2,398,100, Lein wrote in a memo to city officials.

"It's not an acre-for-acre situation; it's a dollar-for-dollar situation," Lein said Tuesday.

As such, the state has asked Orange Beach for $198,100 worth of conserved property to insert into the equation, said Phillip West, Orange Beach's coastal resources director. The simplest solution, West said, is for the city to give the state 19.81 additional acres south of City Hall. That land has already been appraised at $10,000 an acre, Lein said.

"From a practical standpoint we're not giving up much," West said. The property is already traversed by three sections of the city's Backcountry Trail and the change in ownership wouldn't affect the popular nature path.

Perdido Key building caps may remain

Originally Published by the Pensacola News Journal

County would have to widen road to support development
Jamie Page • jepage@pnj.com • October 13, 2008

Escambia County likely will call off its pursuit to remove building caps on Perdido Key — for now.


In December 2007, county commissioners voted to remove the caps. However, the Florida Department of Community Affairs refused to approve the move.

The county contends it has addressed the state's concerns. But recognizing the DCA likely won't support the cap removal without a major financial commitment to widen Perdido Key Drive to handle added development. Commissioners are expected to vote Thursday to repeal the ordinance they created last year to remove the caps.

"I believe we have the legal basis for our claim. The caps should be removed," said Commission Chairman Gene Valentino, who represents the district that includes the Key. "But I think there are certain factual findings that we can not substantiate effectively. We have to sharpen our pencil further on our case to DCA."

The votes are there to support his move to back off for now. Commissioners Mike Whitehead and Grover Robinson IV have said they'll support it.

The DCA's concerns remain the same, claiming the county hasn't identified a funding source to pay for widening Perdido Key Drive, demonstrated adequate sewer capabilities for added development or proved the Perdido Key beach mouse will be protected.

Perdido Key resident Dan Henderson, 68, has the same concerns and is glad to hear the board may call off cap removal.

"They don't have the infrastructure to support it," he said. "It isn't that we are against growth. We are for controlled growth on Perdido Key."

Henderson said he isn't convinced the narrow barrier island needs a wider road.

On the other side of the issue are residents like Alison Davenport, a real estate broker specializing in Perdido Key.

"The caps should be removed and let concurrency be the driving force for development, as it has been everywhere else in Florida," Davenport said. "But I agree the road should be widened, regardless ... to make it safer."

Whitehead said DCA likely will want to see road contracts in place before it will support removing the cap, and that could mean two to three years before the county submits a new DCA request. Valentino thinks it will be much sooner.

"It will be months. It better not be years. Otherwise the economic consequences to our citizens will be graver," Valentino said.

A maximum of 7,150 dwelling units — houses or condominiums — and 1,000 hotel or motel rooms are allowed on Perdido Key. The county's proposal would have increased it to 12,000 dwelling units and 2,500 lodging units.

One of the primary issues that has stymied its DCA request is a Florida Supreme Court ruling last year. The ruling initially put the brakes on the county's intent to issue $135 million in bonds for the widening of Perdido Key Drive, Theo Baars Bridge, and Sorrento Road from Blue Angel Parkway to U.S. 98.

The court since reversed its decision, allowing property tax for such projects paid for through tax-increment financing to proceed without voter approval.

Gregory Strand, who filed the 2006 lawsuit, has asked the court to reconsider, making the TIF unavailable until it's resolved.