The privately-owned Bayshore Apartments and Newport Marina are located in lower Newport Bay adjacent to iconic Pacific Coast Highway. At the beginning of this year, Bellingham Marine began the project to replace the entire marina, and within just three and a half months, the new marina construction was substantially complete.
The owners of this marina wanted to replace this aging marina as quickly as possible, increase the slip count where possible, and build a marina that would last well into the foreseeable future. This new state-of-the art concrete Unifloat marina includes a total of a total of 50 slips ranging from 22 to 62 feet long, with FRP (fiber reinforced polymer) thru-rods, rounded finger ends, and a composite decking overlay which provides a nautical look with the structural benefits of concrete Unifloat underneath.
Typically on our blog I like to write technical or educational pieces that have an overall focus on marina design best practice, innovation and industry trends.
Improvements made to the Unifloat concrete floating dock system have improved the system’s durability, longevity and performance.
I make a conscious effort to stay away from brand specific pieces as I do not want to compromise the credibility of our blog by including sales pitches.
This article strays a bit from my traditional focus but I thought it still worthwhile to share as many of our readers are familiar with the Unifloat concrete dock system and may have the same question one of our recent clients had – What is the difference between the Unifloat system you produce today vs. the one you manufactured thirty to forty years ago?
For all intents and purposes, to the untrained eye, today’s Unifloat dock system looks very similar to the ones manufactured by the company in the mid to late 1900’s – after all, today’s Unifloat is characterized by the same overall design concept as the original. The modules are still made from concrete, most commonly connected by treated timber walers, which are held in place by through-rods.
Bellingham Marine is proud to be an ISO registered company with a strong foundation that benefits the health of our company as well as that of our customers.
In a recent focus group, participants were asked how they would choose between similarly capable marina companies when it came to purchasing a new dock system. What would be most important to you? For the participants, quality was the number one determiner followed by value.
Although the group shared a number of strategies they would use to determine the level of quality, some insight into a company’s commitment to quality can gained by seeing if they are quality certified.
For those who want the best value and highest level of quality from their suppliers, an ISO Registered Manufacturer is a good place to start. The program’s independent registrar audit can be a key discriminator of a company’s commitment to quality and action.
ISO stands for the International Standards Organization; there is no other organization with the exception of the Precast Institute that offers the same level of quality assurance for the end user. The organization’s quality management system (ISO 9001), is the only Q.C. program that focuses on the processes of the entire company and ultimately the customer. In contrast, the emphasis with other quality programs is placed solely on the product.