Great Bay Rowing will not pursue a boathouse at city’s waterfront development

posted on 2/26/2025

Great Bay Rowing announced to the Cochecho Waterfront Development Advisory Committee that it will seek a new permanent home and no longer pursue building a community boathouse for its operations at the city’s waterfront development.

Great Bay Rowing President Scott Bogle said at the committee’s Feb. 18 meeting that GBR’s board made the “difficult decision” after receiving the report of GBR’s funded geotechnical study of the site. Bogle said that based on the results of the study, GBR estimated it would have to raise “at least another million” for site remediation and soil stabilization costs to build the concrete piers to support the building’s foundation, bringing GBR’s total estimated construction costs to more than $3 million. Great Bay Rowing has been working with CWDAC for the past few years to build and maintain a state-of-the-art community boat house. Bogle thanked the city for being a long-standing partner of the organization.

Great Bay Rowing has utilized the city’s waterfront for more than a decade and played an instrumental role in contributing funds for the construction and installation of the paddle dock, one of the first pieces installed for the public park for the waterfront development. The paddle dock will be installed seasonally at the waterfront site once the shoreline stabilization and other site improvements for the public park are completed.

For more information on Great Bay Rowing, visit https://www.greatbayrowing.org.