Union-Trib:
Recent extreme tidal conditions appear to have eaten away part of the sandy bluff that supports Coast Highway 101, forcing the city of Encinitas to launch an emergency repair effort this week.
Two sections of the bluff on the east side of the highway, just south of the bridge and along the lagoon inlet channel, have eroded away, city Public Works Director Glenn Pruim said Monday. The larger of the two spots is 30 feet long and about eight feet deep, but it's the other, slightly smaller section that's even more worrisome, he added.
That's because erosion in that area has actually started undercutting the roadway, and the city has had to close one of the two northbound vehicle traffic lanes, he said.
Let's make the decaying roads in Encinitas a priority. Instead of purchasing plywood for Pacific View.
ReplyDeleteHow much did the dredging of that side of the lagoon contribute to the erosion.
ReplyDeleterelocate mouth of lagoon please. the columns supporting the existing bridge is a huge safety risk.
ReplyDeleteObvious question:
DeleteIf they relocated the mouth, wouldn't that just relocate the bridge, the columns, and the erosion problem to another location?
Perhaps dredging the lagoon inlet on the east side of the road wasn't such a good idea.
DeleteI disagree. Without dredging the lagoon mouth would silt over and the lagoon would become a fetid puddle.
DeleteBecause we have installed flood controls, we have to use artificial means to keep the tidal flow open. It also means we should expect to spend money fighting this kind of induced erosion. It also means we will need to do sand replenishment.
As is usually the case, tinkering with nature often leads to a cascading series of unintended and expensive consequences.
(See: climate change)
We see climate change every day. So what else is new? If you mean global warming, that's a crock.
DeleteI guess it depends on whether you trust 97+% of peer-reviewed scientific literature (including the stuff funded by the Koch brothers), or a guy on a blog who doesn't understand the difference between climate and weather.
DeleteI walk my dog on San Elijo overlooking that spot, and noticed the road being undermined a couple of months ago.
ReplyDeleteIt's right at the end of the rip rap that protects the Kraken parking lot and the traffic signal.
This isn't natural bluff. It's earth that was piled up to elevate the causeway. Without the hand of man, the lagoon mouth would shift around between the current location all the way to Seaside Reef parking lot. Without a roadway or upstream flood controls, silting would raise the riverbed, and floods during the rainy season would allow the water to cut a new path to the sea.
Ideally, the entire roadway and railroad would be on pylons, and the river would be allowed to flood again, bringing sand to the beaches, and nutrients to the lagoon.
Not going to happen, though. Too expensive, and too much expensive real estate has been built in the natural flood plain.
11:33 Rare for the EU blog — a comment by a reasonable person who knows what he or she is talking about.
DeleteSorry for that.
DeleteYup, nature has been tampered with there. They do need the pylon bridge like they have at Ponto...
DeleteLet's prioritize spending and do this: "Ideally, the entire roadway and railroad would be on pylons, and the river would be allowed to flood again, bringing sand to the beaches, and nutrients to the lagoon.". This solution has been talked about since I moved here in 1973. It's about time we do something about it. We can start by redirecting the rail trail money.
ReplyDeleteThat's not how that's going to work. The rail trail is coming out of a separate pot of funds. They do need to reconfigure that bridge, though...
DeleteEven if we could redirect the rail trail money (which we can't), it would cost billions.
DeleteLiterally billions.
It does no good to put the road and rails on pilings without allowing the watershed to flood naturally. Much of the city of Escondido was built on the tamed floodplain of Escondido creek.
To restore normal flows, we'd have to buyout or create a public fund to insure current real estate owners from Mt Palomar to RSF, and all points in between.
We should not have done it, but it's done now. We're stuck with the costs and consequences.
Or we can borrow another $13 million and build more expensive non essential structures that will not do anything for the average tax payer.
ReplyDeleteAren't SurfRiders going to protest? These morons want everything to collapse, as they erroneously think sand comes from bluffs. In reality, it came from the rivers and streams, which have been dammed or redirected.
ReplyDeleteThe El Nino rains are soon to arrive - watch 101 take a dump into the drink, along with some bluff facing houses.
ReplyDeleteSylvia Brown lives!
ReplyDeleteWho is Sylvia Brown?
ReplyDeleteBobby's Sister
ReplyDeleteShe is a prognosticator of likely future happenings, in other words, a fortune teller, unless I am mistaken and confusing her with another.
DeleteSylvia Brown claimed to be a psychic and claimed she could talk to dead or missing people,and conned many grieving families who were vulnerable to such shenanigans.
ReplyDelete