Benefits to aesthetics, the environment, boating safety, tourism

Brevard County, MIRA and the City of Cocoa are planning to provide mooring field facilities stretching across the Indian River Lagoon, from Cocoa Village to Merritt Island’s Griffis Landing at Blue Crab Cove, which lies within the MIRA 520 Sub Core Area. A mooring field in Florida is a legally defined area within a body of water, established by local ordinance, requiring a management plan that regulates activity within the defined field.

The mooring field amenities development would provide substantial benefits to aesthetics, the environment, boating safety, tourism and the general use of the Indian River Lagoon by local and regional boating enthusiasts.

What a regulated mooring field, utilizing modern mooring technology, can help solve:

• Prevention of high-traffic area navigation hazards
• Damage to seagrass from dragging anchor, vessel grounding
• Damage to waterfront properties and local vessels from breakaway vessels during storms
• Potential collisions between anchored boats
• Abandonment of unwanted vessels

This will be a joint application by the City of Cocoa on behalf of the Cocoa Village CRA and Brevard County Natural Resources with match funding from the Merritt Island Redevelopment Agency for funding assistance (for Phase I: planning, engineering, feasibility and permitting) from the Florida Inland Navigation District (FIND) and has an approximate 3-year window to completion.