Update on the Continuing Delay of Repairs to Angel Island Docks

A year ago, we wrote optimistically about the plan to begin reconstruction of new docks in Ayala Cove on Angel Island in June 2026. With June fast approaching, we reached out to Angel Island State Park to find out the status of Ayala Cove for this summer. Unfortunately the news is not what we’d hoped or expected. The updated timeline for construction is now estimated to be between June 15, 2027, and October 30, 2027.

The allowable season for construction on the Bay is June 1–November 1, and it appears the construction would not be able to “meet the environmental window” to finish by November this year. We’re told that the construction plans are still being finalized and the updated timeline for the project looks something like this: May through August, complete State Fire Marshal and BCDC reviews; September through October, prepare the bid documents and announce the project for bid; November through February, award the bid and prepare the contract. An obvious question would be, how could they ever have started in June 2026 if all the above is yet to be completed? Perhaps we’ll never know.

In the meantime, other work being discussed includes the need for dredging, for which the planning and funding process has not yet begun. Our contact at State Parks said they had been advised that the new pilings would not be affected by or prevent dredging because “the pilings are to be set on the bedrock and are not dependent on the depth of soil around the pilings.”

For the upcoming summer season, the outer leg of the docks is out of service due to the number of broken pilings. “We may need to disassemble those floats eventually as the next storm season approaches,” SP says. Though ideally, they’d like to “keep the floats in place as long as possible to protect from broken piling navigation hazards.”

The diagram above illustrates the current open (green) and closed (red) slips and the length restrictions. Most of the 21 closed red slips are the larger, deep-water slips that used to accommodate boats of 40+ feet and a six-foot draft, while the 24 green slips are mostly for smaller, shallower-draft vessels. Not surprisingly, on sunny summer weekends the demand for all of these slips is much higher than the supply.

This is tragic for the legions of Bay Area sailors who have long savored the lunch-and-hike stop at Ayala Cove on Angel Island. It essentially means that access will remain excessively restricted until sometime in 2028 if all goes according to plan, and things rarely seem to go as planned. Like the currently silted-in entrance to San Francisco Marina, the crumbling docks in Gashouse Cove or the abandoned- and derelict-vessel problem in the Oakland Estuary, it remains mystifying why municipalities and the public agencies in charge of managing one of the Bay Area’s most valuable attributes, the Bay itself, seem unable to recognize the community benefits of a waterfront or cope with the challenges. All of these problems limit the public’s access to the Bay. Luckily, once you push off from the shoreline and go sailing, you can leave the failing shoreline infrastructure behind and enjoy a day on the water.

That’s all we have for now. We try to keep our ear to the ground on all the barriers to accessing the Bay, and we’re sorry to hear everyone’s enjoyment of Ayala Cove will continue to be constrained and delayed. If you hear anything else, please drop us a line and let us know: [email protected].