True Nature Stories: Moving Sand at Ocean Beach

Moving Sand Along the Esplanade (March 7, 2023)

The battle between nature and civilization at Ocean Beach began in the 1800s, when San Franciscans started coming out to enjoy the amenities at what had previously been referred to as The Great Sand Waste. The Cliff House was built in 1863, and Adolph Sutro opened Sutro Baths in 1894. (The Sutro Baths building survived into the 1960s, when it was bought by developers who planned to tear it down and build high-rise apartments on the site. On June 26, 1966, it was obliterated by fire during deconstruction, then bought by the National Park Service in 1980.)

The original Beach Chalet was built right on the beach in 1892, but it was moved inland after a storm in 1914 nearly wiped it out, along with much of the beach itself.

In the photo above you can see part of the Ocean Beach Esplanade that was built by Maurice O'Shaughnessy in 1928 to protect development near the beach. The sea wall between Noriega and Santiago streets wasn't built until the 1980s after part of the Great Highway collapsed onto the beach. When the area had been threatened by storms back in the 1940s the city had dumped tombstones taken from the Laurel Hill cemetery.

During the last year or so I've often walked to the beach down Noriega Street and have been impressed by the nearly continuous need to remove sand from the Great Highway. The Noriega Street beach entrance sits between a set of dunes to the north and the sea wall to the south, and sand loves to pour onto the road through the slot. Just yesterday I was interested to see the latest attempt to control the sand and protect the road -- in part, it appears, by removing the slot.

Design plans from 2010 are still being carried out for the whole Ocean Beach waterfront. The artist's concept of how it will all look is quite nice (as those things go), and it will be interesting to see if it all comes to fruition.