"California's Coastal Processes and Issues"

The processes controlling this coast include:

The geology, sea level history, waves, weather and climate, sand

supply, and human influences.

The 2 main issues facing the coast in the next few decades are:

1. Getting and keeping enough sand on enough beaches to satisfy

the recreational and tourist demand, and so to continue deriving

the enormous economic and cultural benefits, and incremental public

and private property protection, depending thereon.

2. Finding and maintaining the appropriate balance between beach

nourishment, sand retention, coastal armoring, and planned retreat

(of both public and private property) that continued beach and

coastal erosion will require.

The research results related to these 2 issues are:

* The California coast is geologically young, active, and steep,

and therefore naturally an "eroding" coast.

* The coast is relatively sand-starved, exposed to moderately

high waves which essentially can transport all the sand

available long distances both on-off and alongshore.

* Coastal sand supply naturally derives from the rivers and

cliffs, with rivers by far the most important in most places.

* River sand supply has been greatly reduced (by over 50%) over

the past century, especially in southern California, by dams

necessary for water supply and flood control, resulting in

increased sand-starvation.

* Wet and dry (stormy and benign) climate cycles exagerate the

lack of sand during droughts, and magnify the erosive effect of

waves during storms (like in many El Nino winters).

* Some coastal structures (ie, Oceanside, Santa Barbara Harbor,

Channel Islands, etc) inhibit the transport of sand by waves,

leading to a mal-distribution of sand in a few places. Bypassing

usually has offset this difficulty.

* Most coastal structures serve to stabilize the beach and create

much wider beaches than would otherwise exist (ie, Marina Del Rey,

Santa Monica Breakwater, Mission Bay Jetty).

* Coastal construction activity (especially in LA) which peaked

in the 1960's, contributed many tens of millions of cubic yards

of sand as byproducts, largely for a time offsetting the sand

supply lost from the rivers.

* Placing sand on beaches in southern California can undoubtedly

widen many beaches.

* Retention structures (groins or offshore breakwaters, depending

on location) can undoubtedly increase the longevity of sand on

many beaches.

(Some of) The "Policy Points" we can discuss and could be the

basis for studrnt projects, are:

* How can governments on all levels to face the economic, social,

and legal challanges posed by:

1) trying to keep enough sand on the beach to satisfy receation

demand, and 2) how to determine the proper balance between beach

nourishment, sand retention, coastal armoring, and planned retreat?

* Much of the land-use planning has devolved to small local

juridictions (like Solana Beach) that must be responsive to their

citizens, and by virtue of their size virtually preclude "regional"

planning approaches.

* Most small cities lack not only the political motivation and

will, but also the resources and the expertise needed to face the

two important issues stated above.

* Regional planning and project efforts (like the SANDAG project)

can bring communities into cooperative efforts to nourish the

beaches.

* How can the both the onorous environmental documentation and

repetitious detailed engineering design processes involved in

routine beach nourishment projects be shortened to save money?

* Can a "sand fee" be implemented as part of water supply and

flood control costs to help fund beach nourishment?

* How can a non-biased cost/benefit study be done to determine

if "planned retreat" is a viable option for private and public

infrastructure and development that may be threatened in the

future?

* Can the intense opposition to coastal sand retention structures

(even in urban areas) ever be overcome to enable more cost-

effective beach widening projects?