The St. Johns County Pier in St. Augustine Beach will be partly closed indefinitely while the county inspects the pillars closest to the ocean.
The county says the last 100 feet of the pier will be closed. Early last week, county officials noticed that some of the pillars appeared to show decay. Typically those pillars would be underwater, but due to a recent beach renourishment project the pillars are now exposed.
St. Augustine Beach Mayor Dylan Rumrell told News4Jax, a Jacksonville Today news partner, that the exposed pillars made the problems easier to spot and also address.
“Before you’d have to send dive teams,” Rumrell said. “You’d have to put people in there to look, but now you’re able to, you know, get a birds eye view without getting wet,”
The county says it made the decision to partly close the pier after receiving advice from an engineering firm. Any further actions will be made with that same group.
The mayor said he hopes the pier is ready and open by the end of the year so the New Year’s Eve fireworks can go off as planned.