PORT ANGELES — A California-based resort developer wants to acquire the 75-acre site of the former Rayonier Inc. pulp mill and build a $120 million waterfront resort.
Jerry Ward, a retired engineer from Palm Desert, Calif., proposes 322 timeshare condominiums, a recreational water park, intertidal aquarium and research center, and a five-level, 750-car parking garage with an elevated 5,000-foot passenger rail line over the Olympic Discovery Trail leading to the Port Angeles ferry terminals.
The development would produce 400 jobs, he said.
“I wanted to have a resort on the north and south end of the Olympic Peninsula,” Ward said, explaining why he chose the Rayonier site.
Ward, who expects to begin construction of a $55 million time-share condo, water park and aquarium project in Ocean Shores on Oct. 1, also proposes mooring the mothballed Navy aircraft carrier USS Ranger to a pier off the site, which would house a naval-aerospace museum, complete with planes on display.
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The rest of the story appears in the Thursday Peninsula Daily News.