![]() However, the store in front does sells snacks and has a bathroom to use before boarding the shuttle since there is no bathroom on the island. Purchase your shuttle tickets and parking pass at the little booth on the pier – not the store in front. Park along the water side at the meters – you can buy a parking pass for $5 that is good for all day when you purchase your shuttle tickets. We took the 10am shuttle to the Island so that there were fewer people and the shells were not picked over. To Clark, though, the important lesson here is that nature can still take control of a situation and alter it.This was probably one of the best things we did on our vacation. While a draft of the report does recommend dredging, Squires pointed out that it does not discuss the permitting or cost of such a project. The report on a two-year study of the situation by a University of South Florida oceanographer is nearly completed, according to Andy Squires, Pinellas County's coastal resources section manager. Goldman said they are hoping to try again this year. The homeowners, who are convinced that the sand came from beach renourishment projects further north, managed to persuade the Legislature last year to approve $1.6 million to dredge out the sand and reopen the pass, Goldman said. Pete Beach bomb isn't the strangest thing to wash up on a Florida beach Some Tierra Verde homeowners were also upset that they no longer had a direct route to the Gulf. Meanwhile the silted-in land bridge has allowed coyotes and dogs to cross over into shorebird nesting territory and kill the birds. That has led to concerns about how stagnant water is killing off sea grass beds vital to the health of the preserve. Then, in 2015, it closed again, and has stayed that way. The water flow through that pass has flushed out the area that was stagnant and revived its natural appeal, said Bouchard, whose shuttle service takes customers out to Shell Key three times a day for what the company's web site calls "some of the best shelling and birding on the Gulf Coast." SHIFTING SANDS: Debby's waves wash away some beaches, leaving tourists amazed "We're pretty happy," said Colleen Bouchard, co-owner of the popular Shell Key Shuttle service. Some people have hailed this new pass as the perfect replacement for the old one. The depth varies from about a foot to maybe four or five feet, he said. "It's awesome," agreed his friend Taylor Donaldson, 24.Ĭlark estimated the pass is about 120 feet wide on the Gulf of Mexico side, about 75 feet wide in the middle and then about 100 feet wide on the landward side. "It's a new spot where people can gather up and join together and have a good time," said Denis Frain, 25, of St. To the quartet of 20-somethings who had anchored their boats at a sand bar in the pass Thursday afternoon so they could hop out and dance and drink a beer or two, it's just "the new pass." ![]() ![]() "I've just been calling it Irma Pass," said Peter Clark, founder and president of the conservation group Tampa Bay Watch. Then Hurricane Irma swept through in September and blew open this new pass, one that has grown wider in the succeeding months. ![]() PREVIOUS COVERAGE: Something is killing Shell Key's nature preserve - but what is it? ![]()
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