Safety Zone; Francis Scott Key Bridge, Patapsco River, Baltimore, MD

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY <SUBAGY>Coast Guard</SUBAGY> <CFR>33 CFR Part 165</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket Number USCG-2025-0680]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 1625-AA00</RIN> <SUBJECT>Safety Zone; Francis Scott Key Bridge, Patapsco River, Baltimore, MD</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Coast Guard, DHS. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Temporary final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The Coast Guard is establishing a safety zone for certain waters of the Patapsco River, in Baltimore, MD. This action is necessary to provide for the safety of life on these navigable waters at the Francis Scott Key Bridge during demolition and construction operations. This rulemaking prohibits persons and vessels from being in the safety zone unless authorized by the Captain of the Port, Maryland-National Capital Region or a designated representative. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This rule is effective from August 15, 2025, through October 15, 2025. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> To view documents mentioned in this preamble as being available in the docket, go to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> type USCG-2025-0680 in the search box and click “Search.” Next, in the Document Type column, select “Supporting & Related Material.” <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> If you have questions on this rule, call or email LCDR Kate M. Newkirk, Sector Maryland-NCR, Waterways Management Division, U.S. Coast Guard: telephone 410-576-2674, email <E T="03">D05-DG-SectorMD-NCR-Prevention-WWM@uscg.mil.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. Table of Abbreviations</HD> <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">CFR Code of Federal Regulations</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">COTP Captain of the Port, Sector Maryland-National Capital Region</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">DHS Department of Homeland Security</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">FR Federal Register</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">MDTA Maryland Transportation Authority</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">NPRM Notice of proposed rulemaking</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">§ Section </FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">U.S.C. United States Code</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">II. Background Information and Regulatory History</HD> The Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) has notified the Coast Guard that it will be conducting demolition and construction activities on the Patapsco River at the site of the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which was hit by a container ship on March 26, 2024, see 89 FR 24385 (April 8, 2024). Debris removal and hydrographic surveying will be conducted on the Sollers Point side of the remaining bridge segments. Marine equipment, including barges, positioned in the Patapsco River will be used to support bridge demolition and debris removal operations. This operation requires the use of a temporary commercial mooring buoy on the Patapsco River, in the vicinity of the old bridge. This operation will not prevent vessels from using the federal navigation channel. The Coast Guard is issuing this temporary rule without prior notice and opportunity to comment pursuant to authority under section 4(a) of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) (5 U.S.C. 553(b)). This provision authorizes an agency to issue a rule without prior notice and opportunity to comment when the agency for good cause finds that those procedures are “impracticable, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest.” Under 5 U.S.C. 553(b)(B), the Coast Guard finds that good cause exists for not publishing a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) with respect to this rule because it is impracticable to publish an NPRM without delaying promulgation of the final rule establishing this safety zone past August 15, 2025, when demolition operations will begin. Under 5 U.S.C. 553(d)(3), the Coast Guard finds that good cause exists for making this rule effective less than 30 days after publication in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> . Delaying the effective date of this rule would be impracticable because the rule must be in effect by August 15, 2025 to respond to the potential safety hazards associated with demolition operations at the old Francis Scott Key (US-695) Bridge. <HD SOURCE="HD1">III. Legal Authority and Need for Rule</HD> The Coast Guard is issuing this rule under authority in 46 U.S.C. 70034. The Captain of the Port, Sector Maryland-National Capital Region (COTP) has determined that potential hazards associated with bridge demolition, which are scheduled to start August 15, 2025, will be a safety concern for anyone near the old Francis Scott Key Bridge (US-695) demolition site. This rule is needed to protect personnel, vessels, and the marine environment in the navigable waters within the safety zone while the bridge is being demolished. <HD SOURCE="HD1">IV. Discussion of the Rule</HD> The COTP is establishing a safety zone from 12:01 a.m. on August 15, 2025, to 11:59 p.m. on October 15, 2025. The safety zone will cover the following area: all navigable waters of the Patapsco River, encompassed by a line connecting the following points beginning at 39°13.40 N, 076°31.28′ W, thence east to 39°13.317′ N, 076°31.167′ W, thence southwest to 39°13.067′ N, 076°31.55′ W, thence northwest to 39°13.133′ N, 076°31.65′ W, and thence northeast to the beginning point, located in the vicinity of Sollers Point. The duration of the zone is intended to ensure the safety of vessels and these navigable waters before, during, and after the scheduled demolition and debris removal. Except for marine equipment and vessels operated by MDTA or its subcontractors, no vessel or person would be permitted to enter the safety zone without obtaining permission from the COTP or a designated representative. The term designated representative includes an MDTA supervisor or contractor on site for the sole purposes of designating and establishing safe transit corridors, to permit passage into or through the safety zone, or to notify vessels and individuals that they have entered the safety zone and are required to leave. In accordance with 33 CFR 165.7(a), the COTP will notify the public by all appropriate means that the safety zone will be enforced. Such means of notification will also include, but are not limited to, Broadcast Notice to Mariners. Vessels or persons violating this rule are subject to the penalties set forth in 46 U.S.C. 70036 and 46 U.S.C. 70052. The regulatory text appears at the end of this document. <HD SOURCE="HD1">V. Regulatory Analyses</HD> We developed this rule after considering numerous statutes and Executive orders related to rulemaking. Below we summarize our analyses based on a number of these statutes and Executive orders. <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Regulatory Planning and Review</HD> Executive Orders 12866 and 13563 direct agencies to assess the costs and benefits of available regulatory alternatives and, if regulation is necessary, to select regulatory approaches that maximize net benefits. This rule has not been designated a “significant regulatory action,” under Executive Order 12866. Accordingly, this rule has not been reviewed by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The Coast Guard has determined that this rule is nonsignificant under Executive Order 12866. This regulatory action determination is based on the size, location and time of year of the safety zone. The temporary safety zone is approximately 1000 feet in width and 2000 feet in length. This safety zone would impact a small, designated area of the Patapsco River for a total of 62 days, but we do not anticipate there will be any vessels that will be unable to conduct business as a result of the safety zone. Excursion vessels and commercial fishing vessels are not impacted by this rulemaking. Excursion vessels do not operate in this area, and commercial fishing vessels are not impacted because the waters in this area are too shallow to accommodate them. Some towing vessels may be impacted, but bridge project personnel have been conducting outreach throughout the project to coordinate with those vessels. Moreover, the Coast Guard would issue Local Notices to Mariners and a Broadcast Notice to Mariners via VHF-FM marine channel 16 about the zone. <HD SOURCE="HD2">B. Impact on Small Entities</HD> The regulatory flexibility analysis provisions of the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980, 5 U.S.C. 601-612, do not apply to rules not subject to notice and comment. As the Coast Guard has, for good cause, waived the notice and comment requirement that would otherwise apply to this rulemaking, the Regulatory Flexibility Act's flexibility analysis provisions do not apply here. Under section 213(a) of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996 (Pub. L. 104-121), we want to assist small entities in understanding this rule. If the rule affects your small business, organization, or governmental jurisdiction and you have questions concerning its provisions or options for compliance, please call or email the person listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. Small businesses may send comments on the actions of Federal employees who enforce, or otherwise determine compliance with, Federal regulations to the Small Business and Agriculture Regulatory Enforcement Ombudsman and the Regional Small Business Regulatory Fairness Boards. The Ombudsman evaluates these actions annually and rates each agency's responsiveness to small business. If you wish to comment on actions by employees of the Coast Guard, call 1-888-REG-FAIR (1-888-734-3247). The Coast Guard will not retaliate against small entities that question or complain about this rule or any policy or action of the Coast Guard. <HD SOURCE="HD2">C. Collection of Information</HD> This rule will not call for a new collection of information under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520). <HD SOURC ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 17k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━