That's a pretty neat set up there. There is a local park here with a
launch on the river that consists of a U shaped "harbor" consisting of
steps made from rail road cross ties, the steps are the height of the
X-ties and about twice as deep. The space between the X-tie at the
front of the step and the next step is filled with pea gravel. THe 5
or 6 different steps accomodate different river levels.

You can float your boat parallel to the steps and board or set the
boat on a step and do a sideways seal launch. The X-ties haven't
gotten slippery and are pretty friendly to hulls.

Scott

(Bob May) wrote in message . com...
You might want to take a look at http://www.hrwa.org/articles/annsville_creek.html
for some idea of what has been done elsewhere.