Manatee County’s Hurricane Idalia repair project is pulling 63,450 cubic yards from the channel to rebuild Coquina Beach
—The dredge is back in Longboat Pass, and for the second time in three years the sand on the bottom of the channel is being turned into beach. This time, under the Town’s sand-sharing agreement with Manatee County, none of it is coming to Longboat Key.
—Manatee County’s 2026 Coquina Beach Hurricane Idalia Storm Damage Repair Project began dredging Sept. 9 and is running 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Crews are pumping roughly 63,450 cubic yards of sand from the Longboat Pass navigation channel onto about 0.9 miles of shoreline on the south end of Anna Maria Island, from just south of 13th Street South in Bradenton Beach to the pass itself. The dredging also restores navigable depth through a pass that shoals quickly, with the contractor cutting to 15 feet in places.
—Public Works Director Charles Mopps alerted the Town Commission before the equipment arrived. “What can be expected is the same type of dredging activity the Town experienced when we dredged the pass, to successfully complete our Gulfside Road Segment nourishment project in 2024-2025,” he wrote. “The Dredge should arrive in the pass and work is anticipated to start this week. The project should be complete within 90 days.”
—The county is now targeting completion by the end of October, and the contractor has said the dredging itself should take about three weeks, followed by final grading. Equipment was staged in the recently dredged New Pass, where some barges will remain because there is no room to park them in Longboat Pass without blocking boat traffic. No dredging is taking place in New Pass.
—The estimated cost is just over $1.92 million. FEMA is paying 75 percent as Idalia storm damage repair, with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and Manatee County each covering 12.5 percent. Work is being done under state and federal permits with sea turtle and shorebird nesting protections, and temporary closures on Coquina Beach move with the active work zone.
—The alternating arrangement is by design. When the pass was dredged in late 2024 and early 2025, the sand went to Longboat’s Gulfside Road beach. Now it is Anna Maria’s turn. The Town signed a similar sand-sharing agreement with Sarasota County this month covering New Pass, which was dredged earlier this year to renourish Lido Key, giving Longboat first claim on that sand the next time around.
—A second, larger Manatee County renourishment project is expected to begin in November.
