For nearly a century, a beloved and historic California pier stood tall, gracing the waters of the Pacific Ocean.
Seacliff State Beach’s pier in Santa Cruz County, however, was no match for a series of storms that pounded the state and left it in ruins, McClatchy News reported.
The “storms destroyed over half of the pier and severely damaged the remaining structure,” California State Parks said in a Feb. 16 news release.
An assessment determined that what was left of the pier “is in a state of imminent collapse and should be removed as soon as possible,” the department said.
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Demolition is expected to begin the week of Feb. 20, the department said.
“We’re dealing with an iconic structure that’s a highly visible part of the community,” Chris Spohrer, the parks department’s superintendent, told Lookout Santa Cruz. “I think there’s gonna be a lot of sadness about the fact that this particular structure is so damaged that it has to come down.”
The SS Palo Alto, a concrete ship built for wartime use as a tanker in World War I, sits at the end of the pier, according to California State Parks. Despite being constructed for war, the ship was not completed until after WWI.
Instead, the ship later made its only voyage from Oakland to Seacliff State Beach, where it was docked and “settled to the ocean bottom,” the department said.
“By the summer of 1930 a pier had been built leading to the ship,” according to the department.
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Aptos resident Brad Kava told KRON-TV that the pier’s demolition feels like “it’s going to leave that park naked.”
“It’s like cutting down an old growth redwood tree,” Kava told the outlet.
The pier was not the only part of the beach severely damaged in the storms, the department said.
“The historic storms destroyed nearly all of the seawall and much of the fill material on which the campground was built,” the release said.
Other parts of the campground, including the underground utilities and parking lot pavement, “were lost to the sea,” according to the department. Ongoing landslides in the area have also affected road access to the campground.
The campground will remain closed through the end of the year, as “State Parks navigates the cleanup and hazard-mitigation effort,” the department said.
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California State Parks said the heavily damaged beach is “evidence of a new reality the state’s shoreline faces as a result of climate change, especially due to sea-level rise and extreme weather.” The department added that moving forward, it needs to work on developing plans to provide “climate-resilient facilities.”
“Seacliff State Beach has been beloved for generations,” Spohrer said in the release. “State Parks looks forward to working with the community, scientists, and environmental stewards to build resilience to sea-level rise and extreme event impacts so that more generations can continue to fall in love with Seacliff State Beach.”
