Originally Posted by Descant (Post 356386)

Kneedeep, welcome to the Forum. I agree with Lakefront. I'm an islander too. But islanders don't need to pump that often due to limited season. The point is, you have a barge and somebody else has a septic pump truck. You need coordination, and a barge big enough to handle the load. Same with a crane, excavator, backhoe, etc. If I need those services, I want to make one call, not several calls, to coordinate two or more companies. Most recently, for small barge work, I had a new refrigerator delivered and installed. The barge operator picked it up at the retail store, loaded onto the barge, delivered and installed, then took the old machine to be recycled. They also installed new water lines for the new icemaker (i.e. light plumbing). In this example, the "barge" was incidental, actually a stripped down pontoon boat, but any boat could have done the same job.

I would say the first order of business is to secure a long term homeport, summer and winter. Can you load equipment and materials there? If not, where? More transit time? This may help determine the type of barging you want to do, mostly mainland waterfront dock work, or all sorts of island work?

Good luck.