California Coast & Ocean

Santa Cruz Harbor Trail Repairs
A popular but sometimes steep and poorly paved trail in the Santa Cruz Small Craft Harbor will be broadened, regraded, and repaved to accommodate wheelchair riders, with the help of $250,000 approved by the Conservancy in November 2007. The Santa Cruz Port District will use the funds, along with $675,000 in private donations and $21,000 of its own money, to replace the existing West Jetty Pathway and add landscaping, harbor overlooks, benches, interpretive signs, and other amenities.

The Pathway runs along the harbor’s navigation channel from a restaurant at the foot of Atlantic Avenue to Walton Lighthouse at the jetty’s south end. Visited by 150,000 people each year, it is a spur of the two-mile Harbor Trail, which in turn is a segment of the Monterey Bay Sanctuary Scenic Trail. When completed, the Scenic Trail will travel along the edge of Monterey Bay from Santa Cruz to Pt. Pinos Lighthouse in Pacific Grove, and will serve as the California Coastal Trail through this area.

Huntington Beach Wetlands Gain
Orange County’s Huntington Beach Wetlands are a remnant of the coastal wetland system created by the meandering of the Santa Ana River, which extended over 2,950 acres before most of it was drained and filled for agricultural and urban development. Much of the approximately 300 acres that remain were cut off from tidal action by construction of the Pacific Coast Highway, channelization of the river, and construction of flood control channels. Over the past 20 years, the Huntington Beach Wetlands Conservancy has acquired approximately 120 acres of degraded tidal marsh, restored 27 acres of one of the marshes in the complex, and constructed a wetlands education and wildlife care center. It continues to restore and enhance the wetlands, as well as acquire new acres as they become available.

With the help of $865,000 approved by the Conservancy in November 2007, 16.6 acres of tidal marsh will be restored and added to the complex, which will total 191 acres when the project is complete. The Huntington Beach Wetlands Conservancy will use the grant to buy the 16.6 acres, which are currently owned by the University of California, Riverside. This acquisition will allow the property to be included in the restoration work scheduled to begin in 2008. Eventually trails will connect the wetlands to the regional trail network and to nearby parks and schools.

River Parkway Progress
For 50 years, citizens groups and community leaders in San Bernardino, Riverside, and Orange counties have dreamed of completing the Santa Ana River Trail and Parkway, running 100 miles from the crest of the San Bernardino Mountains to the coast near Huntington Beach. About half of the parkway has been completed or is under construction, and now, with the help of a $2,750,000 grant approved by the Conservancy in December 2007, planning and design can go forward on 29 more miles in the three counties. When these projects are completed, only 11.5 more miles will be needed to finish the parkway.

More than 7 million people live in the region through which the trail passes, one of the fastest-growing in California. When and if it is completed, the parkway will be one of the longest urban recreation and river parkways in the nation. It will connect 17 cities, traveling from the coast up through urban areas of Orange County and the Inland Empire to National Forest wilderness areas. The trail is designed to be used by bicyclists and horseback riders as well as hikers, and will connect inland communities to the California Coastal Trail. Within communities, it will link playgrounds, schools, commercial centers, residential neighborhoods, and natural areas.

Progress on the parkway proceeded in fits and starts from the 1950s until 1990, when the three counties, along with 11 cities and various agencies, came together to adopt a regional approach to planning the trail. In 2005 the parties adopted a Parkway Partnership Action Plan to help coordinate planning and secure funding for trail projects. The Partnership’s work plan lays out a strategy for completing the backbone of the trail by 2012.

Orange County has already completed 24 miles of trail and has to build only 4.5 more miles to finish its stretch of the parkway, but the projects needed to complete them--including one road undercrossing and two bridges across the Santa Ana River--are complicated and potentially costly. The County will use the Conservancy funds to refine trail alignments, develop conceptual plans, identify areas where right-of-way agreements will be needed, and prepare an engineer’s report for the projects required to finish three of the 4.5 miles. Riverside County has completed 12 miles of the parkway and will use the Conservancy funds to plan alignments, analyze environmental impacts, and complete detailed engineering and permit applications for its remaining 22 miles. San Bernardino County will use the Conservancy funds to design approximately four miles of trail in its remaining 14-mile gap. These four miles will connect to the county’s existing seven miles of paved parkway. Eighteen miles of dirt National Forest trail also lie within the county’s boundaries.