Highway 87 now open again

HIGH ISLAND — Officials Thursday morning closed state Highway 87, which was covered by 2 feet of water.

The highway’s low-lying stretch between Rollover Pass and state Highway 124 was closed about 4 a.m., when high tides associated with a tropical depression in the Gulf sent water over the road.

The Texas Department of Public Safety said at 5:20 p.m. the highway had reopened.

Only people with photo identification who were able to prove they either work or live on either side of the closure were allowed past the barricades, a dispatcher said. The passage would require a state trooper escort, the dispatcher said.

The National Weather Service expected elevated tide levels through today, and Galveston County remained under a coastal flood warning. The Galveston-Port Bolivar Ferry operated normally and was unaffected Thursday by the elevated tide levels, a ferry spokesman said.

Crenshaw Elementary and Middle School on Bolivar Peninsula will not close today, the school district said.

The high tides also prompted La Marque officials to close Highland Bayou Park most of Thursday after water covered the park’s back roads, City Manager Eric Gage said. The park closure was just a safety measure, he said.

High waters also covered the low lying roads of Old Bayou Vista, where residents were forced to park their cars on high ground at a carwash near state Highway 6 and wade home. The high water was about knee-deep in areas surrounding Louie’s Bait Camp.

That didn’t stop Kevin Luksa from trying to launch his boat from the bait camp’s boat ramp. The Bayou Vista resident wasn’t headed out for a day of fishing. He said he braved driving through bumper-high water so he could get his boat off the trailer and back to his house where he could put it in a lift and get it out of harm’s way, just in case the water got higher.