By Janet Miranda – Reporter, Houston Business Journal
Seventeen years after Hurricane Ike devastated Galveston, the region’s long-anticipated storm barrier — known as the “Ike Dike” — has achieved a significant milestone.
The Gulf Coast Protection District recently approved two major engineering design contracts, advancing the largest coastal protection initiative in the U.S. Dallas-based Jacobs (NYSE: J) secured the contract for designing the Bolivar Roads Gate System, also known as “The Gate,” which will span the 2-mile-wide waterway separating Galveston Island from Bolivar Peninsula.
Omaha-based HDR Inc. will design the Bolivar and West Galveston Beach and Dune System, a project focused on restoring vital coastal ecosystems and reinforcing natural barriers in the region.
Spanning from Galveston Bay to South Padre Island, the project represents a comprehensive risk-management strategy for Texas’s coastline. It employs multiple lines of defense to reduce storm surge threats and restore damaged coastal ecosystems.
“Everyone’s been waiting to see some progress on this project,” said Heather Betancourth, the Gulf Coast Protection District’s communications director. “We can’t get to construction without moving those two features in design, so it’s really the first step to kind of realize the bigger portion of this project.”
