CAPITOLA – Stacy Souza works primarily from her home in Capitola's Jewel Box neighborhood, only a minute or two from the Cliff Drive commentary deck, which overlooks the town's iconic — albeit recovering — wharf and the majestic Pacific Ocean, continuously swaying backwards and forwards with various intensity.
To prevent any appearance of cabin fever, Souza takes her eight-year-old German Shepherd, Otto, for no less than one walk a day through the cliff area.
“There are a lot of bikers, joggers and dog owners like me,” Souza told the Sentinel during a recent late-morning outing. “We all have our community. It's like, 'Hi, how are you?' We know different people and we wave.”
But Souza and her fellow panorama lovers may sooner or later have to seek out a brand new route – identical to the numerous cars that clog the streets every single day during rush hour.
Parts of the large coastal cliffs – city authorities estimate their height at 12 to 18 meters – are constantly eroding and ending up within the sea. City planners consider that those responsible must take motion to stop a destructive landslide scenario that will not be a matter of whether it can occur, but when.
“Nobody is going to spend money on it,” Capitola Public Works Director Jessica Kahn said in a report presented to the Capitola City Council last month. “But it's definitely something that's going to happen in the future.”
Kahn said the bluff is currently eroding at a rate of about 6 inches per yr, although large storm events can speed up that pace. Most recently, a series of atmospheric river storms and tidal surges within the winter of 2023 caused significant erosion, particularly at the bottom of the bluff beneath two parking lots at either end of the road. The storms also damaged an old 10-foot-high soil nail retaining wall near the highest of the bluff that was inbuilt 1997.
In addition, if a seismic event were to tear off a big a part of the cliff, this is able to not only pose a danger to pedestrians and motorists, but could also affect larger parts of the population because essential infrastructure facilities similar to sewage and water pipes laid within the slope can be destroyed.
In light of recent events, the town has accomplished a comprehensive current condition report as a part of its Cliff Drive Resiliency Project, which analyzes a 900-foot section of the road and bluff. The city has already received grants to get the project underway, however the City Council must determine which direction it desires to go.
“We are not only repairing the erosion, but we are also looking into implementing a comprehensive coastal protection project for this section of road,” Kahn said.
Options on the table
After the 2023 storms, the town secured $9.25 million in everlasting restoration funds from the Federal Highway Administration and contributed one other $1.25 million as a neighborhood grant, in accordance with Kahn. However, those federal funds should not available ceaselessly and the project have to be ready for a construction funding application by September of next yr. The California Coastal Commission has also contributed $500,000 toward a project.
“The project will likely cost more, but the total cost will not be known until a final plan is in place,” Kahn recently wrote to the Sentinel, adding that the town continues to hunt additional funding opportunities.
The path ahead of us takes three routes: protect, adapt, retreat.
The approach to orderly withdrawal, which was utilized in a recent Employee reportis easy. It means taking no motion while outages proceed to occur on the cliff, potentially resulting in the closure of Cliff Drive and diversion from the locally designated emergency route.
Option 2 gives the town time to make short-term adjustments, similar to repairing the eroded sea caves at the bottom of the cliff, while long-term measures, similar to potentially converting Cliff Drive to a one-way street heading west, are considered.
But it was the third – and most costly – option that received probably the most vocal support in council. Although the small print of the ultimate project have yet to be worked out, the aim is to preserve the road in its current state and supply improved facilities for cycles and pedestrians. This could include constructing a brand new wall with anchors anchored deep into the center of the cliff, rock face protections and creating recent lookout points and improved coastal access.
Capitola Deputy Mayor Yvette Brooks said throughout the meeting that the “protect” option makes probably the most sense to her, assuming funding efforts are successful.
“We know there have been several natural disasters,” Brooks said. “We see the impacts and we know we have to do something.”
Councillor Joe Clarke felt that this selection was far superior to all others.
“We need to protect it as best as we can,” Clarke said. “Option 3 seems to me to be by far the best.”
Kahn added that the town held a town hall meeting on the situation in February within the Jewel Box neighborhood, attended by about 20 people. The overwhelming feedback from that group, she said, was that “if it's affordable and feasible, the city should do something about the erosion on that bluff.”
Robert Stevens, a representative of CSW/ST2, which was hired by the town last October to supply design services, added that his team had a “very productive meeting” in regards to the various options with the Coastal Commission, which must approve the project.
“I think there is a way forward,” he said.
Expert comments
“Because of the nature of the rock and the nature of the fractures, it’s just difficult to protect this area,” Griggs told the Sentinel.
The cliffs, which extend about three miles from Pleasure Point right down to New Brighton State Beach, are composed primarily of Purisma bedrock, which is geologically relatively young at 2 to 4 million years old and rests on a soft layer of mudstone.
The Purisma is understood for its jagged structure – like a broken windshield – that might be undermined by crashing waves or, perhaps more critically, by rainwater from the neighborhood seeping into the cracks. And with climate models pointing to more extreme periods of dry summers and rainy winters, the erosion process could speed up.
Although Griggs will not be entirely convinced, based on his own local knowledge and historical photographs, that motion must be taken to guard the cliff yet, he agrees that the concrete armoured wall, as might be seen at Pleasure Point, is the “simplest” solution.
But in the long term – and he admitted that there are different definitions of this – there is no such thing as a easy answer.
“Sea levels will continue to rise, storms will continue to occur, and we will not be able to hold the fort everywhere,” Griggs said. “There may be places that we believe are worth protecting.”
Kahn said there are opportunities for public involvement within the resilience project, including a yet-to-be-launched online survey and a pop-up booth on the Sunday Art on the Beach event on July 21 in Capitola Village. More intensive outreach will begin once the council officially selects a preferred plan, she added.
Meanwhile, Souza, who was unaware of the town's efforts, will proceed to walk the scenic spot every day and hopes to proceed doing so for years to come back.
“It's a world-class view,” she said. “I don't see why we shouldn't protect it.”
Originally published:
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