The St. Tammany Fishing Pier is touching land again for the first time since 2021, a milestone crews reached this month as they push toward finishing the storm-hardened structure by the end of 2026. Built with steel piles and decking meant to better withstand future storm surge, the rebuilt pier along Lake Pontchartrain in Slidell is now in its final stretch of construction after nearly five years of closure.
The update came via a video posted by St. Tammany Parish on Facebook on Sunday, showing crews working on finishing touches and safety enhancements for the pier, which the parish says should be complete by the end of 2026. The parish's video specifically credits the new steel piles and decking with better withstanding the effects of any future storm surge, a direct response to the timber failures that doomed the structure during Hurricane Ida in August 2021.
That storm hit just four days before the pier was scheduled to officially reopen from a previous expansion project, according to a project update posted by St. Tammany Parish. The site had just undergone extensive upgrades, including shelter structures and cleaning stations, before Ida wiped much of that work out.
A $3 Million Rebuild Funded Largely by FEMA
St. Tammany Parish President Mike Cooper announced in February that construction had officially begun on the pier, marking the end of nearly five years of planning and engineering design, per the parish's own account. The $3 million reconstruction is supported by $2.5 million in FEMA disaster mitigation funding, with the remaining $440,000 coming from local parish and grant sources, the parish government has said. Securing that federal money reportedly took nearly three years of negotiations between parish officials and FEMA following the hurricane damage.
Those dollars trace back to an October 2024 capital budget ordinance approved by the St. Tammany Parish Council, which allocated more than $2.15 million in federal FEMA grant funds and $338,000 from the BP Louisiana Tourism Recovery Program specifically for the pier's repair and mitigation. Comprehensive damage assessments prepared by Meyer Engineers had formed the basis of the parish's FEMA disaster assistance claims.
The rebuild itself involves removing the damaged timber and installing 25,000 pounds of structural steel framing, decking, and piles, along with extending the pier by 70 linear feet onto an existing jetty, according to the parish. That steel design is meant to replace the timber components that failed during past severe weather, permanently changing how the structure is built to face the lake.
From Katrina Debris to a Second Life on the Northshore
The pier's history stretches back to another storm entirely. It was originally built using repurposed concrete spans salvaged from the old Interstate 10 Twin Span Bridges, which were destroyed during Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, according to The Historical Marker Database. The original 650-foot pier opened to the public in June 2012, the first public fishing pier the region had seen since the 1960s.
Once finished, the rebuilt pier will look different in another way: parish officials plan to operate it free of charge and keep it open to the public 24 hours a day, a shift from its pre-Ida operations, which ran on set daytime hours and required admission fees. Located off East Howze Beach Road in Slidell along Lake Pontchartrain, the pier gives anglers access to redfish, spotted trout, flounder, drum, and Lake Pontchartrain blue crab, according to Visit The Northshore.
Part of a Broader Coastal Push
The pier rebuild is one of 16 coastal protection and restoration initiatives currently underway across St. Tammany Parish, stretching from Madisonville to Slidell and the Pearl River. Among the parallel efforts is the $2.4 million Tchefuncte Breakwater wall, designed to combat shoreline erosion — part of the same parish-wide push toward hardening coastal infrastructure that Hoodline has previously reported on in connection with the historic Tchefuncte River Lighthouse.
Once complete, the pier will be managed by the St. Tammany Parish Department of Public Works and governed by codified parish rules that prohibit swimming, fires, glass containers, and crab traps on the structure. With the pier now physically reconnected to land for the first time since 2021, the remaining work centers on finishing touches and safety enhancements that officials say should wrap up by the end of the year.
