A new provision tucked into this year’s federal military policy bill bans any new anchoring locations for barges traveling on the Hudson River.
President Donald J. Trump signed the annual National Defense Authorization Act into law on Friday. The omnibus package includes a bill introduced by U.S. Rep. Pat Ryan, a Democrat who has long fought against barges being able to anchor in the Hudson.
“For far too long, big corporations have polluted and put at risk our precious river in pursuit of profits,” Ryan said in a statement. “But not anymore.”
U.S. Rep. Mike Lawler, a Hudson Valley Republican, co-sponsored the bill. He said the river “has faced serious ecological challenges for decades, and this law makes clear that our towns, homeowners, and riverfront communities come first.”
The signing comes more than two years after environmental groups sounded the alarm after the U.S. Coast Guard changed regulatory language that opened the possibility of new barge anchorages between the Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge and Troy. Currently, the only anchorage in that span of the river is in Hyde Park. Environmental groups were most concerned about potential spills. As well as polluting the drinking water for residents of the seven communities that get drinking water from the Hudson — Hyde Park, Lloyd, Esopus, the city and town of Poughkeepsie, and the village and town of Rhinebeck — the groups worried about the impact on the natural world.
Scenic Hudson President Ned Sullivan said the barges posed “a serious threat to local fish and aquatic life, whose habitat would be destroyed if a spill happens.”
There are limited spots on the river wide enough for anchorages, but the regulatory change sparked concerns that the river near Kingston and Newburgh would host vessels waiting to head north to the ports at Albany and Coeymans.
The outcry came after the Coast Guard redefined the boundaries of the Port of New York in July 2023. For regulatory purposes, the Port of New York was described as the entire Hudson River from the Statue of Liberty to Troy. But the regulations changed the northern boundary of the port to just 25 miles north of the Statue of Liberty. As a result, areas along the Hudson River north of the Cuomo Bridge no longer fall under the Port of New York regulations, which allows control of where vessels can anchor.
The Coast Guard rescinded the new language in November 2023 following backlash, but left open the possibility of anchoring barges in the future, promising to “undertake extensive public outreach opportunities to explore potential regulatory updates” if it did so.
Friday’s signing of the defense bill ended that possibility.
It is the second time Hudson Valley communities have fought anchorages on their river. A yearslong battle erupted in the 2010s after tugboat and barge operators proposed 10 new sites capable of holding 43 vessels between Yonkers and Kingston. The plan was scrapped in June 2017.