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Park Cleanup  (updated 03/09/09)

A contractor has been selected and contracts let for cleanup of the beach side of the park. Heavy equipment lies all over the place, and large pallets are situated for placement on the beach to support equipment that will dig up sand, pile it, sift out debris and replace sand on the beach.

Debris is collected and piled in small mountains to be carried away in large hopper trucks. All structures will be razed, pavement lifted, all utilities except telephone removed and everything cleared to the ground. This will be complete by the end of March 2009. The park will be completely redesigned and rebuilt. The process may take 5 to 7 years.

On March 7, 2009 the headquarters building and parking lots were gone. The RV campgrounds were flattened and utilities were out of the ground. The small beachside parking and access areas were completely bare and huge sand mounds were awaiting return to the beach. It will all be cleared by the end of the month.

However, the north side of 3005 is another story. Debris is lighter, fewer structures need replacement, debris is lighter and can be removed manually, so cleanup is an easier task. Volunteers already have the area almost cleared.

The Galveston Bay Foundation annual "Bicycle Around the Bay" event was scheduled for October 18 and 19, 2009. Hurricane Ike changed their plans. Instead they decided to hold "Cleanup Around the Bay". On Saturday October 18 over 200 volunteers signed up around the park, and they fanned out into the brush to carry all sorts of things to the roadway for later pickup by park personnel. All enjoyed a Jason's Deli lunch.

Doane College is a small liberal arts college in Crete, Nebraska. Each winter in January a small group of biology students travels ro Galveston's TAMUG for a coupule of weeks in the warmer weather to study Marine Biology. This year instead they came to Galveston Island State Park rummaging through the brush along trails and roadways gathering debris of all description to build a trash  mountain at the maintenance shed. We thank them for their labors. I understand that they spent their last evening celebrating at Landry's.

In mid-January a convoy of buses arrived from St. Agnes Academy of Houston Bellaire, and Hans Haglund welcomed about 250 girls, parents and faculty/staff to the park. They filed into the ponds trail and fanned out into the prairie grasses and brush. Its amazing the size of some of the things they carried to the trail for transport to form a trash mountain at the maintenance shed. It was difficult to imagine these girls as demure young ladies in prom dresses, however a few did sit down for an impromptu tea party.