Port of Hueneme gets $2M federal grant for planned parking structure

Brian J. Varela, Ventura County Star
·2 min read
The Port of Hueneme was a awarded a $2 million federal grant last month to fund the planning phase of parking structure construction project.
The Port of Hueneme was a awarded a $2 million federal grant last month to fund the planning phase of parking structure construction project.

The Port of Hueneme received a $2 million federal grant last month to plan out a parking structure for staging offloaded vehicles.

Port CEO Kristin Decas said early estimates put the total project cost between $60 million to $70 million. She anticipates the project will be completed in the next 10 years.

“This is the seeding money to get it out of the concept phase and into an actionable project phase,” Decas said.

The funding comes from the Port Infrastructure Development Program through the U.S. Department of Transportation Maritime Administration. The program allocates money to decarbonize, upgrade and rehabilitate ports.

California ports received $74.5 million of the nationwide $662 million allocated this year, according to the Department of Transportation.

The local port could look to private funding, bonding and more grants to fund the parking structure, Decas said.

The details of the project will be hammered out during the planning and engineering analysis phase, including how many vehicles it can stage. The parking structure will be built within the port’s gates, Decas said.

It will also have an emphasis on length, not height, to avoid obstructing views.

The structure could allow the port to stage more vehicles, Decas said. In fiscal year that ended June 30, more than 375,000 vehicles moved through the facility, port data shows.

“It’s an investment that will bolster the efficiency of our operations,” Jess Herrera, president of the Oxnard Harbor District, said in a news release.

The planned structure will coincide with another parking project in south Oxnard.

The port is moving forward with a 34-acre parking lot on Hueneme Road that is anticipated to stage up to 4,944 vehicles shipped by GLOVIS America Inc.

Construction on the Hueneme Road lot is expected to start in January and end in March, Decas said.

Brian J. Varela covers Oxnard, Port Hueneme and Camarillo. He can be reached at brian.varela@vcstar.com or 805-477-8014. You can also find him on Twitter @BrianVarela805.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Port of Hueneme gets $2M federal grant for planned parking structure