The Boston Redevelopment Authority has given a limited liability corporation tentative designation to create a 420,000-square-foot "soup to nuts" seafood processing facility — docks, auction storage, transport — at the tip of the Marine Industrial Park on the south side of the main channel into Boston Harbor.
The expressed aim of the $70 million American Seafood Exchange project is to ensure that the Port of Boston "retains existing fishing boats and attracts additional boats from elsewhere in New England and along the East Coast," the would-be developers explained in a PowerPoint presentation provided to the Times.
Today, Gloucester and New Bedford — two of the nation's first fishing ports and among the few still fully industrial — account for the bulk of fresh-caught seafood from New England waters, with Boston accounting for barely 3 percent of landings in volume and value, according to the latest figures, for 2009, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Read the complete story from The Gloucester Times.