Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.
- Matthew 7:24-27
Looks like big trouble at the city's $3 million lifeguard tower.
From the Inbox:
I was talking to a contractor that mentioned the wash out at the lifeguard tower construction site on Moonlight Beach. He claimed the runoff from the adjacent streets overwhelmed the flimsy drainage set-up at the site and has done damage. The caisson holes were drained and there are large gullies within the fenced off area, which can't be part of the plan. He suggested this will stall the project some and involve added costs. The specific details would probably have to be revealed by the contractor building the tower. Don't look for the city to publicize this incident, as someone forgot about winter rains.
The little black pipe was supposed to handle the run-off; the orange fencing is where the torrent actually tore thru. The other shots are erosion damage.
Begin 50 whiny anonymous comments NOW
ReplyDeleteQuote: nervous city planner.
Delete12:19 PM And you are . . . oh yea - Anonymous!
DeleteAbout 6 months ago at the previous "King Tides" there was a lot of wave erosion where the rocks are in picture 3. This is just a regular normal event of the type that is easily predicted. Just plow the sand back in there and keep on building, no need to ask for overrun money due to unpredicable acts of nature.
ReplyDeleteI guess you don't understand the issue. This torrent will flood the new structure - it is in the pathway of the water runoff pattern from streets. This is not wave erosion.
Delete12:25 PM Were you an engineer on the Tower of Babel? Yes - a normal event, but mans' artifacts placed in locations of peril due to direct exposure to these forces. You don't build in the middle of a waterway course way. If so, you divert the course way - this has not been done.
Delete$3.7 million is the projected cost. The bond issue was $3 million.
ReplyDeleteAh, what's a little $700,000 overrun going to hurt?
ReplyDeleteThe City Council just saved almost $500K by choosing to appoint a fifth member rather than calling for a special election, so we're only about $200K in the hole net.
DeleteThe wisdom of building in a flood plain is clearly illustrated today. Just who could not see this coming?
ReplyDeleteNo amount of underground concrete supports and allowing the ground floor to wash through, will ever make this location for the Marine Center viable.
This shortsighted approval is on council alone. The contractors will have reason to up the bucks on this ill-fated location to no end. If anyone believes extra funding will not forthcoming, I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I can sell you.
And the base foundation caissons are probably not anchored to bedrock - which means they also could potentially weaken under extremely severe conditions. It is like Fukashima construction- rated for a point 7 quake and got hit with a 9.
DeleteI talked with a worker a month or more ago when the pile driver was being utilized. I asked how deep they were going and was told 60 feet. I asked if they had hit bedrock. The worker laughed and said NO.
DeleteI walked away wondering if the structure would withstand the kind of wind-driven enormous surf at high tide we had back in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Probably not. It's easy to forget what windy gully-washer storms can do here after so many years of normal or below normal rainfall. The 5+ years of drought have lulled us into a false sense of complacency. There were people who warned about the location of the new tower.
Only warnings the City heeds are those that come from Marco and Meyer.
DeleteIf the caisson frames were not filled with cement prior to the flooding, they are now likely filled with sand. They would then have to be cleaned out, as the caisson strength is based on the cement filler. Reaming out a 60 foot iron frame without the sand dial effect refilling as material is removed? This friction caisson depends on the cement exerting horizontal pressure on the iron framework, but it is still anchored in inherently weak sandstone. How does one spell boondoggle? Marine Safety Center, that's how!
Delete3:16 PM You nailed it precisely. Short memories or ADD. The lead-in Biblical passage is appropriate too.
DeleteRemember that picture of the ground breaking ceremony for the lifeguard tower with the city council? Get them to return to the site with their shovels to fill in the enormous hole; let them rectify their mistakes.
DeleteYep. That or pay the $700K overrun out of their pockets. Throw Tasha into the mix too, she would have approved the project and vendor.
DeleteThe drainage from adjacent streets runs directly across the observation area or down the access walkway to the beach - that is not appropriate for the volume of water that can cascade off the surface streets. A separate diversion culvert needs to be built and that won't be cheap. This will have to be addressed, as the new building will be vulnerable to flooding if the condition is not corrected.
ReplyDeleteMaybe kayaks can be part of the station equipment, so lifeguards can save themselves from the occasional deluge!
Masih Maher and the other city engineers call the existing drainage perfectly acceptable.
DeleteThe Titanic engineers said the same thing.
DeleteWe need a Safety Center II to save the Safety Center I! Next on the council agenda.. . .
DeleteMaybe put some pontoon floats on the side of Pacific View for the back up!
There is a •North Coast Highway 101 Streetscape Improvement Project ◦Case #10-035 DR/CDP and Case #10-036 GPA/SPA/LCPA draft EIR on the city website under public notices. The review period - Review and Public Comment Period - December 2, 2016 to January 16, 2017. Has anyone read it?
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone know about it? SOP at the City: no input really wanted, then they'll tell us the plan they passed was created by heavy public input.
DeleteYou have to know to go to public notices, but did Blakespear put it in her latest newsletter to help spread the word? Probably didn't even occur to her, she's busy nodding as staff tells her they've told the public all about it and not to worry her little head.
It's traffic gridlock in the making. One lane in each direction for 2.5 miles, five roundabouts between Jupiter (Just Peachy corner) and La Costa Ave. A sixth roundabout at El Portal.
DeleteSouthbound 101 traffic that backs up two lanes wide from Leucadia Blvd north past Jupiter and sometimes all the way to La Costa Ave whenever the southbound freeway plugs will now double in length and be further gridlocked by the useless roundabouts.
The project is another city boondoggle. The council and staff refuse to learn from their many huge mistakes.
No, I mean have residents been alerted? I know about it, but most don't - and anyone who drives the 1 will be affected, which is pretty much most of the city.
DeleteThis is a carryover from Peder Norby's proclamation that Leucadia was "blighted." In his eyes, anything not covered in cement fits that description.
Shaffer then said the plan was decided and that we needed to "move on."
Full steam ahead nmo matter the cost to community character, public safety, and city finances.
Did anybody who lives in the Leucadia 101 corridor get a notice in the USPS mail?
DeleteThe plan the draft EIR describes is not the Plan #4A the City Council approved with only three votes on January 13, 2010. The #4A plan has been changed in major ways. Seems that makes it illegal.
Full steam ahead, bait-and-switch tactics not a problem for our Council.
DeleteWatch, construction will be done at the same time as the freeway widening. Between Del Mar and Encinitas we should be able to effectively cut off the rest of San Diego to California. At least there will be more trains that go nowhere you need them to and run at times nobody wants to ride them.
DeleteRossini Creekgate; now Ivory Towergate! Is there a hydrologist in the house?
ReplyDeleteAnother city failure. What else is new?? This one will be swept under the rug like all the others.
ReplyDeleteMuch like the additional?1M in construction costs for the library...
It was worse than that. The library was budgeted at $14 million. It ended up costing $20 million. The city had to float bonds to fill the financial hole.
DeleteThere was also the $3½ million cost overrun on the Mossy Chevrolet/Public Works yard on a property that was supposed to be "turnkey." Among other things the buildings weren't ADA compliant.
The $5 million dollar life guard tower will do nothing for safety. But the lifeguards and sheriff sure will have bitch fort to hang out in which will distrac them from their guarding duties.
ReplyDeleteWhy put a $5 million dollar structure in the surf zone? They should not have listens to Giles. He just wanted a bitchen fort similar to the Mcmansion fire stations.
What dumb asses. Carlsbad City Council is smarter than Encinitas City Council. They don't build any of this shit and waste all this tax payer money.
The winning bid was $3.7 million. The bond issue was $3 million. Interest on the bonds will at least double the tower's cost.
DeleteGiles wanted a lifeguard station to rival the new stations in Del Mar and Solana Beach.... kinda like penis envy.
DeleteMoonlight and the TJ river are the two worst for runoff pollution in the county. the hit to tourism because of beach closures will be a costly problem. More concrete and higher densities will only make it worse. They get rich and we get to live in their fifth.
ReplyDeleteThe next housing element has to include protections for our surrounding nature preserves. Clearly, we have a runoff problem.
That includes Meyers and Gonzales' mouths.
Delete7:36,
DeleteSource data, please?
6:19 AM Go into the archives. 7:36 PM is absolutely correct - Moonlight has a major pollution issue when the runoff is high.
DeleteJust went to pull the latest data. Interesting thing is that there are no recent samples taken. That is one way to avoid beach closures.
DeleteImprovements have been made at Moonlight, however, last I saw we still get an F after a rain. TJ river is the only other F.
Water recycling and as little concrete as possible should be a requirement for new builds, even offer incentives to current homes.
Eco tourism provides more money to pay pensions than any developer ever will. Problem is the environmentalist are either too poor or ethical to bribe city folk.
It is no secret 6:19, a simple google search will confirm.
DeleteI'm always skeptical of claims made without data or sources. But in this case the OP was right.
DeleteWhat's not clear to me is the effect of building the UV treatment station just upstream of the outflow, or the restoration of the creek above ground at Cottonwood Creek Park. Those had to help. I'd like to see more of that kind of remediation required to offset development.
Also, drone strikes on people who don't pickup their dogs' turds.
Nothing wrong with asking for sources this just happens to be specific enough to ask the google.
DeleteCan someone please explain why the previous lifeguard tower stood on that spot for, what, 50 years? And now you're all saying it's a terrible site.
ReplyDeleteWhat's changed from the last 50 years?
Sea level has risen an eighth of an inch?
Everybody wants to have the ego boost of using "common sense" to make themselves feel smarter than the engineers who have years of specialized techniques, tools, education, and experience.
Sorry, but I'm betting this isn't a big deal. The tower will get built, and it will be just fine.
As someone noted, the engineers overlooked the perilous nature of the location. It was moved back from the original, directly into the course of the water drainage coming off the surrounding surface streets. The old tower hasn't been there for 50 years, but had the water coursing nearby; I'm sure there were years it got flooded. This is not just a one-time event that can be over looked - it will require retrofit water diversion - not sandbags or small gutters. The engineers got lucky that this problem was exposed now - had the SS Marine Safetygate Tower been completed and then laid to waste by a rainfall extravaganza, they'd be trying to rename it the Tower of Pisa. If you're a betting man, better have contingency plans.
Delete6:18 AM Did your head get buried in the sand too?
DeleteI wonder if building the "observation tower/garage for lifeguard equipment" had an impact on the course of the flooding from the street during heavy rain?
Delete11:13 PM I think you are correct - water split directions and moved across the deck and to either side of it. I think the runoff diversion caught the contractor off guard, as massive amounts then went down the walkway and directly thru the construction site. This condition will absolutely have to be remedied - it would damage the new structure in the future. The question then arises - who pays for it? You can bet the contractor has clauses in the agreement to indemnify himself from "unforeseen" complications - that is standard. The Gilded Tower may just have gone up in cost!
Deletethat is what city council gets for listening to a life guard convince them that a $4 million dollar life guard tower will make lifeguards guard better. Haaaa Haaaa... what dumbasses.
Delete6:18 = city worker practicing the BS here before facing council.
ReplyDeleteWait for council to swallow the excuses hook, line, and sinker - then praising "staff" for its hard work and a job well done. The wait won't be long.
No activity at the work site today - nothing. I suspect the contractor is reevaluating the situation. Things are NOT "fine", as 6:18 AM naively commented.
ReplyDelete6:18 is not naive, 6:18 is a member of "staff." I guarantee it.
DeleteWhy is staff in quotes? Am I supposed to be an imposter?
DeleteWhat's the nature of your guarantee? What are you offering if you are wrong?
I'm pretty sure you are wrong, and I probably have more information about the conditions of my employment than you do.
"Staff" is always in quotes.
Deletelol, 10:35. That "platform/deck/garage," at a cost of over $1 Million, should never have been built on the bluff. That exacerbated the run-off problem. Lifeguards could have kept their equipment next to existing stations, and, when not at use, at the nearby public works yard.
ReplyDeleteSomeone praised up and commented on how the brilliant engineers couldn't be wrong - they have degrees! Well - this is wrong! The issue of water runoff apparently wasn't considered, as they had a 6 inch plastic drainage pipe. That would handle the runoff of a garden hose, but not a standard Winter storm. It is time for retro-engineering and I suspect it is no easy fix.
ReplyDeleteWhat, $1.1 million for a two-car garage and $3.7 million for a lifeguard station aren't great prices?
ReplyDeleteIts expected by Encinitas city Council. They pay $10 million for a $4 million piece of property. Encinitas has a history of being ripped off.
DeleteDrunken sailors syndrome.
DeleteDo the Sheriff's get an aqua escape combat car? They'll also need flippers and goggles to escape their compartment in the new Tower of Doom!
DeleteMore rain coming . . what's ya gonna do???
ReplyDeleteCall it an auxiliary water park!
Raging Waters II
DeleteThe lifeguards won't have to go far to practice swift water rescue!
DeleteLook to the design contractor's errors & omissions insurance.
ReplyDeleteDepends if runoff water discharge/flow was part of the contract consideration. City people were there today - with more rain to come this weekend.
DeleteSomeone not the taxpayers should foot the bill for incompetence. The City needs to figure out how to make that happen. They hired the company, they should have some minimal level of expertise to know good quality from poor
ReplyDelete