Sailing proposals diverge
SUN PHOTO BY GREG MARTIN, gmartin@sun-herald.com
With a two-masted sailboat at anchor in the background, a small sailboat owned by the Charlotte Harbor Community Sailing Center sits onshore at Punta Gorda's Bayfront Center Friday at Gilchrist Park.
SUN PHOTO BY GREG MARTIN
Tommy Jones, left, operates a dredge while a co-worker, who declined to be identified, operates a Bobcat while dredging the Gilchrist Park boat basin Friday. The city hired the workers' company, Marine Contracting Group, to help develop a public boating facility.
SUN PHOTO BY GREG MARTIN
John Ryan, who moved to Port Charlotte from Minnesota recently, takes in some fishing from Gilchrist Park near a city anchorage Friday. Asked for his opinion on plans for more boating facilities in the area, he replied, "It's all good."
SUN PHOTO BY GREG MARTIN
This sailboat was one of a half-dozen taking advantage of the city's designated anchorage near the U.S. 41 bridge on Friday.
PUNTA GORDA — Almost like two ships passing in the night, two nonprofit groups are drafting separate plans to develop facilities for boaters at the Bayfront Center building and boat basin at the city’s Gilchrist Park.
One plan, by the Charlotte Harbor Community Sailing Center, calls for the center to lease the Bayfront building and use its revenue to make the boat basin more accessible for small-boating programs to include sailboats, canoes, kayaks and paddle boards.
