LAST MONTH I talked with Terry McPhail who, with brother Gary, runs the business, and he told me the complex has grown steadily, especially over the past 15 years or so. "I don’t think there are many more boats on the coast than there were in the past, but they are certainly getting bigger. The average size in our marina is now about 45 feet or so, and in the yard the average is close to 50 feet. One of our yards has a contract on a 109-footer."
Terry told me his father Jim, who was in the construction business, bought the property in the mid-’50s when it was a farm and a sand pit. In the mid-’70s, with growing demand for marinas, he got approval to build a small one on the river beside the farm, and Shelter Island has grown from that modest beginning.
"I started here in the mid-’70s with my brother Gary when I was 16," Terry told me. "That first marina got its power from a diesel generator because there was no power down here then, but it took off quite quickly from there. In 1979 my dad got our first 60-ton travel lift, and we paved an area to put the boats down on the hard so either the owners or their workmen could work on them."
Jim McPhail decided that he would not put marine railways on the property, forseeing that the future would be in handling even large boats with travel lifts, for environmental reasons.
"We don’t have much more room to expand the marina," Terry explained, "but the side of the business that has really taken off is the boatyard, or shipyard side. In 1994, we managed to convince Seatec Marine to bring in their 150-ton travel lift, one of the biggest on the coast, outside of the one at Crescent Marine. And a few years ago we bought a 70-ton lift and a 30-ton hydraulic trailer, so we can handle almost any boat on the coast now."

THERE ARE 30 businesses on the Shelter Island site. Two of the bigger boatyards are Bracewell Boatworks and Rockport Yachts, Inc. Bracewell, is involved in a range of projects — from refits and repairs to new boat construction. When I visited Shelter Island they had four projects on the go, including a complete refit of a 71’ sailboat and a new 54’ semi-custom trawler-style luxury yacht under construction. Rockport had no less than five refits on the go, ranging from an extension on a 48-footer to a major refit and paint job on a 96’ Westport. Rockport is also getting into new construction, building designs from company owner Andrew Tower and from marine architect Steve Seaton.
There’s only one major broker at Shelter Island, Bob Brown’s Capstan Marine, but Terry is trying to attract more new boat brokers out to the yard. There are quite a few specialty boat people there, including cabinetmakers, caulkers (there are a lot of wooden boats in the yard), diesel and gas engine mechanics, sailmakers, upholsterers and painters. The speciality shops cater both to the nearby
boatbuilders and to individual boat owners. Teresa Cutting, at Shipshape Interiors, says that 60 to 70% of her business is refits, with new boats making up the rest of her work. Shipshape crafts interiors for boats ranging from small cruisers all the way up to a just-completed 85’ luxury yacht.
All this industry makes for a busy yard. "I’ve noticed that recently it’s turned into a 12-month a year business," Terry said. "We used to be really busy from March to July, now we’re going hard year-round. December was really busy last year."
Shelter Island, which is owned entirely by the McPhail family, covers 34 waterfront acres, with an additonal nine acres of waterfront lease. The facility’s reputation has grown mostly by word of mouth and they get boats from all over Greater Vancouver and Vancouver Island. The yard’s key to success is summarized best by McPhail: "People know that they can get anything here, and that we’ll take good care of them personally when they bring their boats up to the
yard. We’ve got everything here."