OCTA completed a large wall to mitigate landslide risks<\/a> where the Mariposa Bridge was knocked down two years ago from a slipping slope. The project included a new section of beach path, together costing nearly $93 million.<\/p>\nAt times during higher tides, the ocean hits directly onto rocks and the tracks in areas of San Clemente, making some of the town\u2019s beaches impassable. Commission staff said in a southern section, sand has eroded from 200 feet to less than 80 feet in less than 10 years.<\/p>\n
One environmental group, Orange County Coastkeeper, urging the commission to deny or amend the application, is calling the request the largest, or one of the largest, potential encroachments the commission has ever considered in a single conditional use permit application.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s no evidence, Coastkeeper officials argue, that the hard armoring will actually protect the rail line.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe staff report is void of any information or estimate of how long the proposed armoring is expected to protect the railroad, if at all,\u201d a letter to the Coastal Commission said.<\/p>\n
The project also does not eliminate or begin to mitigate its shoreline impacts, the Coastkeeper letter argues. \u201cIt is difficult to quantify what the tremendous loss of beach will cost to the ecosystem, the local economy, and to the people of California that use and enjoy this treasured stretch of coastline.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Coastal Commission staff is recommending a 10-point mitigation program and a long-term railroad adaptation study, to be completed by Nov. 2030, to fully address the impacts of retained and new shoreline protective devices.<\/p>\n
Under the mitigation program, at least 690,000 cubic yards of sand would be put in place, and unnecessary rock should be removed to open up beach space and public access improvements.<\/p>\n
Sand would be sourced from either offshore borrow sites and brought by dredger, or delivered by truck from Prado Dam, where a stockpile of sand is currently sitting and needs to be removed, with the hope of starting the sand portion of the project by next February, the commission report said.<\/p>\n
OCTA has incorporated mitigations and has committed about $100 million, nearly one-third of the overall project budget, to restoring a critical coastal trail connection and placing approximately 690,000 cubic yards of beach-compatible sand, OCTA Chair Jamey M. Federico said in a letter to the commission.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese investments provide significant coastal resources and public access benefits and directly advance key objectives of the commission,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The south end of San Clemente has historically been a direct connection to San Onofre State Beach, which includes several world-class surf breaks and beaches untouched by development. The continued beach erosion\u00a0 \u2014 and rocks and revetments covering more and more of the sand space \u2014 pinches off access to that area.<\/p>\n
Coastal Commission staffers are recommending monitoring and reporting on sand movement, including impacts on nearby kelp and reef habitat, with a final report in 10 years.<\/p>\n
Sand monitoring should not just be required, but there should also be a requirement to replace a loss of beach, Coastkeeper argued in its letter. \u201cMonitoring without action is not mitigation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Advocacy group Save Our Beaches, which formed in recent years to advocate for sand over riprap, argues that approving the permit not only would retroactively authorize OCTA\u2019s coastal activities over the past five years, along with new developments that include a vertical seawall at San Clemente State Beach, but also would allow future dumping of up to 15,000 tons of riprap on any beach in San Clemente on an \u201cas-needed basis under a poorly-defined maintenance program.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile the commission\u2019s staff report documents OCTA\u2019s failure to comply with past agreements and permit conditions, repeated unauthorized rock dumping, and reluctance to provide full transparency regarding its engineering plans,\u201d Save Our Beaches said in a letter, \u201cthe report also notes the permit would result in the largest single loss of beach to armoring in the last 50 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Save Our Beaches sees the proposal as progress, it\u2019s not enough and \u201csignificant concerns remain,\u201d the group said.<\/p>\n
There should be a smaller footprint at State Beach, and while a seawall size and scope was reduced, there\u2019s concern that a vertical seawall \u201ccould generate even greater turbulence and scour than the sloped and irregular revetment,\u201d Save Our Beaches argued, noting the seawall could be placed as close as 15 feet from the tracks instead of encroaching on the sand.<\/p>\n
The group also said OCTA should be subject to continuing beach-performance requirements, rather than a one-time sand placement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Coastal Commission has documented years of unauthorized armoring, failed commitments and substantial destruction of public beaches, yet its proposed permit still does not require OCTA to maintain a sandy beach, restore continuous public access or demonstrate lasting mitigation for the damage it has caused,\u201d the group said.<\/p>\n
OCTA should be required to maintain an 80-foot beach in front of all coastal armoring for the duration of the permit, the group added.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur beaches are a public resource, central to San Clemente\u2019s identity and quality of life,\u201d the group wrote in its letter to the commission. \u201cThe Coastal Commission must ensure that any authorization for coastal armoring includes meaningful, enforceable protections for the beaches and public access that would otherwise be lost.\u201d<\/p>\n
State Parks\u2019 Orange Coast District also weighed in on the portion that could impact San Clemente State Beach, expressing concern that protecting the railroad corridor through shoreline armoring \u201cwill come at a substantial cost to public beaches, coastal resources, and recreational opportunities that make this stretch of coast so valuable\u201d Riley Pratt, senior environmental scientist for State Parks, said in a letter to the commission.<\/p>\n
The State Parks\u2019 Sea Level Rise Strategy identifies nature-based solutions, with the preferred alternative being sand nourishment without hard armoring, or a seawall over rock revetment, which has a \u201csubstantially larger footprint.\u201d<\/p>\n
The California Coastal Commission meeting starts at 9 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 5; find out more at coastal.ca.gov.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A controversial plan to protect the coastal rail line from the sea where it runs beachfront in south…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518519,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,1785,7,23,611,9963,10808,136],"class_list":["post-518518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-beaches","tag-california","tag-local-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orange-county-transportation-authority-octa","tag-san-clemente","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}