NEWS FROM THE DELAWARE DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROL
April 27, 2010
Vol. 40, No. 132
Contact: Jeffrey Tinsman, Delaware Artificial Reef program manager, 302-739-4782, or Michael Globetti, DNREC Public Affairs, 302-739-9902.
NYC subway car sinkings reach end of the line for now on Delaware's artificial reefs
It’s the end of the line for the deployment of New York City subway cars on Delaware’s artificial reefs—at least the end of it until the next line of subway cars are shunted into retirement. The last 24 older model cars made available as reefing material recently went down onto the Del-Jersey-Land Inshore Reef, bringing the total number of subway cars sunk on the state’s artificial reefs to 1,329 since the first deployment in 2001.
The retired cars came to Delaware waters as always from New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority. “It’s been a most productive association and a win-win situation” for New York City and the state of Delaware in recycling the subway cars as reefing material, said Jeffrey Tinsman, Delaware artificial reef program manager with DNREC’s Division of Fish & Wildlife. “This has been our best reefing project in terms of volume of material donated and the value of the donation to our reef program,” he said. “The subway cars count as a match for federal funding dollars, and it’s always a challenge where your match will come from. In taking these subway cars for reefing, we got the cars and also got donated services for cleanup and towing from New York City's transit authority.”
Between 2001, when reefing of the subway cars began, and 2003, 619 stainless steel cars were sunk. A second stage of deployment on Delaware’s reef sites, from 2008 to the present, saw another 710 cars sent to the ocean floor as reefing material. The subway cars make ideal reefing material, because their windows and other cavities provide the perfect sanctuary for reef fish. Within a few weeks, blue mussels, sponges, barnacles and soft corals attach to the structure, and in about a year, the reef will be fully productive, resembling natural habitat.
The cars in the last deployment, like all those previously dropped onto Delaware artificial reefs, were 60-footers, while New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority now runs 75-foot subway cars on its rails. Of the six Atlantic states participating in the subway car reefing program, Delaware was most prominent among them, and Tinsman said that rates future consideration for more cars “when New York City decides which model of subway cars they will be retiring next in four or five years. We’re certainly not ruling out the possibility of continuing our association with NYC Transit.”
The operation for dropping the last 24 cars onto a Delaware artificial reef was carried out by the marine transportation division of Weeks Marine, Inc., a worldwide towing and barge operator contracted by New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority, which also completed the car cleanup to remove all greases and buoyant materials that might be harmful to the marine environment.
The deployment on the Del-Jersey-Land brought to almost 350 the number of subway cars along a stretch of man-enhanced marine habitat that is the state's newest artificial reef. Delaware's largest artificial reef, the Redbird Reef, has nearly three times that many subway cars placed throughout the more than 1.3 square nautical miles of ocean bottom comprising it 16 nautical miles off the Indian River Inlet. The Redbird Reef's name is in fact a derivation of New York City's "Red Bird" subway cars that make up much of the reef.
ABOUT DELAWARE’S ARTIFICIAL REEF PROGRAM: Delaware has 14 permitted artificial reef sites in the Delaware Bay and coastal waters, with five of these sites located in federal (ocean) waters. Development of the sites began in 1995 as part of a comprehensive fisheries management effort by the Division of Fish and Wildlife’s Delaware Reef Program. For more information, visit Delaware's artificial reef program web site or contact Jeff Tinsman, Delaware Reef Program administrator, at 302-739-4782.
