Long Beach port awards contracts to Moffatt & Nichol

Long Beach port awards contracts to Moffatt & Nichol Long Beach-based Moffatt & Nichol has received two contracts with the City of Long Beach to provide engineering and environmental consulting services.
   The first one-year contract, with options for two additional years, is to provide as-needed dredge engineering and environmental support, environmental maintenance or management consulting for ecologically sensitive areas, architectural design and support, civil engineering, and other professional consulting services. The contract, effective Oct. 1, covers up to $400,000 for the first-year period.
      The second contract involves a study to investigate reconfiguration of the Long Beach Breakwater to improve water quality and restore recreational surfing. City officials have commissioned this study to gauge federal interest in supporting further, more detailed, study of the project's feasibility. Financial details of the contract were not released.
   The nearly nine-mile-long stone breakwater, one of the longest in the world, was built in three sections from 1899 to 1949. The oldest section protects the Port of Los Angeles and the middle section protects the neighboring Port of Long Beach. The third and eastern-most section fronts a small portion of the port, then extends away to shelter the city's main beaches and the port's main anchorages. The Army Corps of Engineers built the breakwater, which remains owned and maintained by the federal government. The third section was specifically built to protect warships when Long Beach was more or less a Navy port during and after World War II.