Daytime Closures At Bayou Sorrel Lock To Last Through The Fall

Vessels transiting the Morgan City-Port Allen alternative route on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway in Louisiana will be dealing with weekday daytime closures at Bayou Sorrel Lock through the fall due to repair and construction operations on the lock’s southwest guide wall.

The estimated completion date is the latest update to a project that stretches all the way back to late September 2021, when the New Orleans Engineer District reported that the southwest guidewall was “in a state of incipient failure.” In the weeks that followed, the New Orleans District undertook emergency repairs to stabilize the old guidewall. By March 2022, the district had begun work to remove old concrete and begin construction on a new southwest guidewall and dolphins. At that time, repair and construction operations were expected to last through the end of February 2023.

But then weather and emergency repair work elsewhere in the district—most notably at Algiers Lock—led to delays at Bayou Sorrel, with the estimated completion date now set at October 30. The lock is closed on weekdays from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. The U.S. Coast Guard advises northbound vessels wider than 35 feet to use an assist vessel when transiting Bayou Sorrel Lock.

Despite the ongoing bottleneck at Bayou Sorrel, Paul Dittman, president of the Gulf Intracoastal Canal Association, which represents operators and other stakeholders at work on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, praised the New Orleans District for its open communications during the repair and efforts to keep vessel traffic moving through the lock.

“The Corps has been very good at working with us to keep the queue down,” Dittman said. “From GICA’s perspective, we’re very appreciative of the Corps’ flexibility and willingness to work with industry to minimize delays while repair work has been ongoing.”