City of Thunder Bay now recommending complete recycling of James Whalen tug

Higher-than-expected bids have prompted the City of Thunder Bay to change its recommendation on preserving parts of an historic tug boat.

Last fall, Thunder Bay City Council voted to preserve parts of the James Whalen tug, and recycle the rest. 

"The tender went out in January, closed early February," said Cory Halvorsen, the city's manager of parks and open spaces. "The award was based on the base price of recycling the entire vessel, and then there were three provisional items that were provided in addition to the base price."

"Those provisional items included a group of about 10 individual pieces, or portions of the vessel that could be sort of selected individually," he said. "And then there were two versions of preserving the deck, either the top deck or the entire deck from the water line up."

However, base price of recycling the entire vessel came in higher than the city estimated, Halvorsen said.

"We had budgeted $290,000 plus or minus 30 per cent at that time," he said. "The base price came in at $579,000."

As a result, the city is now recommending council award a tender to recycling the entire Whalen, not preserving any of it, in a report being presented on Monday.

The Whalen was built in 1905, and was brought to Thunder Bay after it was retired in the 1990s. It had been moored at Kam River Heritage Park until it was found submerged in the river about three years ago.

The city has since moved it to a dry dock on private land.

The report states the city did look at some other options aside from recycling the vessel. There were discussions with the Transportation Museum of Thunder Bay, for example, "to offer them the opportunity to fund the provisional items included in the tender that would retain select pieces or entire portions of the deck on the condition that they would fund the additional costs and take over full ownership."

While the museum was interested, the report states the museum — which operates the Alexander Henry historic ship that's docked at Pool Six — said it was unable to commit unless it received a "viable long term land use licence," which would allow the museum to apply for funding.

The problem with that, Halvorsen said, is the city has a limited amount of time to award the tender, and negotiation a land use agreement with the museum would take months.

Moving the Whalen to another city-owned site, meanwhile, would be very challenging, Halvorsen said.

"Due to its mass, it is incredibly challenging and costly to move it anywhere," he said.