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City staff outline Brum Dam rehabilitation, O'Connor Landing repairs and recent dredging along Oklahoma River
Summary
Public works staff described planned winter work to expose and repair parts of Brum Dam, boat-lot repairs at Brum Dam to reopen a lock by Oct. 1, completed dredging at May Dam and follow-up spoil removal, and continuing vegetation and cylinder replacement maintenance.
Oklahoma City Public Works officials told the Oklahoma City Riverfront Redevelopment Authority on Sept. 23 that crews will perform a Brum Dam rehabilitation this winter requiring drawdowns of the river basins and that boat-lot repairs should reopen a lock by Oct. 1.
Jess Shumway, Oklahoma City Public Works, said the Brum Dam rehabilitation will “require us to drain the western basin and lower the eastern basin, to expose the lower section of the dam to complete the work.” She said the project team is aiming to complete the work during the city’s slower months this winter.
Shumway said crew activity along the river included completed dredging at May Dam; she told trustees the contractor is expected to begin removing spoil piles within about 30 days. A separate work order covered repairs to the Brum Dam boat lot; Shumway said those repairs are anticipated to be completed by Oct. 1, allowing the lock to be usable again.
Other maintenance items described included a awarded spring-and-vegetation contract now active in river basins “to keep the vegetation to a minimum” and ongoing cylinder replacements at Brum Dam, which Shumway said “takes pretty substantial equipment to reach the center of the dam to remove the cylinders.” She added that Public Works crews removed approximately 120 cubic yards of debris from the river during August.
Trustees were also told that the First Americans Museum riverboat landing had a ribbon-cutting Sept. 8 and that final work on O'Connor Landing remains; one trustee noted a cruiser will likely not use that landing until next spring. Shumway confirmed there are still a “couple items left to do on the O'Connor Landing itself,” and the authority should expect limited service to that landing until work is finished.
The consent docket that included the river project summary was approved by the authority during the meeting.
Practical implications: the drawdown and repair work will limit full river navigation while crews expose and work on the Brum Dam structure; spoil removal and boat-lot repairs are scheduled in the coming weeks to restore some usages. The authority did not provide a detailed contractor schedule or a formal reopening date beyond the Oct. 1 estimate for the boat lot repairs.
