By Adam Kaye
North County Times
November 16, 20061
ENCINITAS
-- An environmental impact report examining the planned
Beacon's Beach Access Project is vague and incomplete in its
assessment of possible harm to the beach, an attorney
representing the San Diego chapter of the Surfrider Foundation
said Wednesday.
The report acknowledges that a planned, 450-foot-long sea wall
that is part of the project could harm the environment and
proposes sand replenishment as a way to compensate for such
damage.
But the report fails to analyze
whether importing sand would effectively make up for beach
erosion and the extent to which beach-building might affect
surfing at the beach below Neptune Avenue at Leucadia
Boulevard, said Todd Cardiff of the Encinitas-based Coast Law
Group.
"We are concerned that the sand replenishment will not be
effective," Cardiff said.
Cardiff said he plans to submit written comments responding to
the city's environmental impact report before a Nov. 23
deadline.
Tonight the Encinitas Planning Commission will listen to
public comments and offer its own responses to the report,
which is posted on the city's Web site. Copies are available
at City Hall and at the Cardiff-by-the-Sea Library. The
commission's meeting begins at 6 p.m. at City Hall, 505 S.
Vulcan Ave.
Published last month, the report concludes that the sea wall,
in conjunction with others nearby, would reduce the width of
the beach by blocking erosion of the bluff behind it.
Sea-wall opponents argue that receding bluffs are part of a
natural, eastward migration of the shoreline, and that by
arresting that migration, beaches become narrower.
The sea wall would further armor an ocean bluff already filled
with sea walls, "resulting in a cumulative visual
impact," the report states. The potential loss of beach,
it continues, cannot be fully corrected.
"We have stated outright in the (report) that those
impacts can't be mitigated below a level of
significance," said Scott Vurbeff, Encinitas'
environmental coordinator.
Vurbeff dismissed Cardiff's criticism of the report.
To compensate for losses, the report orders the city's Parks
Department to replenish the beach with sand when more than 8
feet of the wall is exposed.
Vurbeff said comments submitted in writing would receive
thorough, written replies.
At tonight's meeting, "We won't be responding to
comments, we will be listening to them," he said.
"We're stressing that people put their comments in
writing so we can respond to them."
Cardiff said the proposed nine-month closure of the Beacon's
Beach access during construction would be unacceptable.
"They're going to have some very unhappy surfers,"
he said.
As proposed, the project would remove the timbers, drainage
lines and other debris strewn across the 85-foot-tall bluff
face, which would be seeded and landscaped. A shower would be
built at the beach.
An improved path would be built from the beach to a
reconfigured parking lot, which would be positioned 5 to 10
feet farther east than the existing one.
City officials say the project would protect a route to the
beach that closed temporarily in 2001 and 2005 after
landslides damaged the trail. Landslides continue to present a
safety hazard, officials say.
No cost estimate for the project was available.
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