California’s beaches are disappearing — San Clemente could need 300,000 truckloads of sand as El Niño threatens an already eroding coast

For generations, San Clemente’s coastline has been part of the city’s identity. Its broad beaches, oceanfront paths and distinctive Spanish-style architecture helped earn the Southern California community its long-standing “Spanish village by the sea” image.

But the beach is getting harder to find.

In sections of San Clemente, the waves are now reaching locations which had earlier been separated from the ocean by a broad band of sand. Erosion at North Beach has shrunk the beach area available for recreational purposes, while coastal bluffs are making the safety of homes and a vital railway line along the beach precarious.


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The enormity of the situation has made it necessary for San Clemente to think of an expensive remedy—sand importation.

San Clemente apparently faces a shortage of 3 million cubic yards of sand. It would take around 300,000 trips by truck to make up this shortfall, says the city manager.

And even if the sand can be found and transported, replenishment would not permanently stop the forces removing it.

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This is actually just one example of a much larger problem for the coast of California. Rising sea levels, increasing wave height and natural sediment supply disruption due to decades of development.

San Clemente has found itself now facing the question that could potentially be asked by many more coastal areas: how much time and money should be spent trying to keep the beach where it is when the ocean continues to move inland?

San Clemente’s disappearing sand is exposing a bigger problem

However, the disappearance of beaches involves more than just the decrease in recreational space.

Sand serves as a natural buffer zone between the sea and the developments along the coastal area.

In San Clemente, it buffers homes, public structures, roads, and a railroad which has been operating in the Southern California region for more than a century now.

San Clemente has witnessed several incidents of erosion along its coastline, especially at North Beach.

It also faces an increasing vulnerability of coastal bluffs, creating a complex scenario where one side of the attack comes from waves at the beach, while another comes from unstable coastal bluffs on the other side and threatens the railroad.

According to Sean Vitousek, who is a research oceanographer with the USGS, the rising sea level is one of the continuous problems in California beaches.

With the rise in sea level, shorelines will tend to retreat inland unless sediments are added.

This problem becomes even more complex because San Clemente does not get sufficient sediment compared to what it used to get before.

At the same time, changing ocean conditions can alter wave behaviour and the amount of energy reaching the shore.

The result is a coastline with less sand available to absorb the force of incoming waves.

Saving the beach could mean moving millions of cubic yards of sand

The authorities in San Clemente have estimated that three million cubic yards of sand will be required to cover their current shortfall.

This figure is hard to imagine. The challenge becomes clearer when considering how the material would actually reach the beach.

City Manager Andy Hall said transporting the entire amount by truck could require around 300,000 truck trips.

Trucking is also not the only obstacle.

The first step that needs to be done is identifying the sources for sand, acquiring necessary permissions, and figuring out how to put the sand on the beach without just washing it off.

For many years, the California coastal cities have been resorting to the beach nourishment technique. This entails the addition of sand to beaches which have eroded in order to widen them.

San Clemente is considering whether it can expand that approach.

The issue has also entered local politics. A proposal on the November ballot would impose a 1% sales tax, with funds intended to support wildfire protection and beach replenishment.

Proponents view the proposal as a means of creating a reliable revenue stream for addressing two issues affecting the city. The opponents concede that sand must be supplied but claim that the responsibility cannot fall on the shoulders of San Clemente residents alone and that a regional approach must be considered.

The discussion shows how beach replenishment faces a fundamental dilemma; although rebuilding a beach is not difficult, maintaining it may prove to be an ongoing cost.

The railway is caught between the ocean and unstable cliffs

It goes way beyond just the recreational beaches of San Clemente.

A portion of railway tracks that runs along the coast for about 7 miles has been undergoing regular shutdowns due to erosion and instability of the bluffs for the past five years.

This segment is a small portion of the much wider network of railways running about 351 miles from San Diego to Los Angeles and to San Luis Obispo.

Transportation authorities have used rocks and other protective measures to shield the tracks from waves.

However, there is one problem associated with the above technique.

When the waves interact with the rocks, they may have enough energy to move the sand on the beach into the sea. In this way, there will be even less sediment on the shore.

Darrell Johnson, chief executive of the Orange County Transportation Authority, has said obtaining permits for additional sand has been one of the challenges.

California's emergency declaration ahead of the expected El Niño could help accelerate some of that work, officials have said.

But sand replenishment is not the only option under discussion.

Authorities are also examining whether the railway could eventually be moved farther inland. Such a project would be expensive and technically complicated, and previous assessments have found relocation difficult to justify financially.

Another possibility is eventually ending rail service along the vulnerable section.

That puts an unusual infrastructure question at the centre of the beach debate: if the shoreline cannot be stabilised indefinitely, what happens to the railway behind it?

El Niño could test an already vulnerable California coast

However, San Clemente is not facing these challenges alone.

All across California, coastal cities have been experiencing erosion, flooding, and dangerous cliffs.

The problem may be even more pronounced in the case of unusual conditions in the ocean and the atmosphere.

The forecast of a particularly powerful El Niño for this particular year only added to the urgency of being prepared. An El Niño is the warming of certain portions of the equatorial Pacific Ocean, which influences weather patterns far from there.

There have already been instances of California infrastructure being threatened along its coast.

For example, a concrete pier was shut down in Pacifica, which is located just south of San Francisco, due to its degradation. Also, in Long Beach, seawater entered people’s homes due to the storm surge that came after a hurricane.

Scientists are also studying how climate change, caused by humans, might impact El Niño phenomena.

For San Clemente, however, the underlying challenge is not dependent on a single storm season.

The rise in sea levels is a gradual phenomenon. An increment in sea levels provides waves with a new elevation point, which allows waves to travel farther into the land in case of heavy rainfall and tides.

There has been a previous prediction made by scientists about significant beach erosion of Southern California in the coming years. This may have consequences not just for recreational activities but also for infrastructure built up along the coastline.

The choices facing San Clemente therefore extend beyond whether to add sand this year.

They may be forced to choose whether to maintain their defences around the existing coast, rebuild infrastructure, or realise that some sections of the community simply cannot stay where they currently exist.

(With AP inputs)