Wave goodbye to what was once Alameda’s shoreline. On December 14 and 15, King Tides and storm surges eroded huge portions of Alameda’s man-made beaches and dunes.
Waves washed away tons of sand and dislodged heavy boulders and bags of concrete from retaining walls.


The storm damage left critical utility structures located at the corner of Shore Line and Westline drives near the kiteboard shack at risk of collapsing. The structures house an electric water pump system that enables the interchange of Bay waters to the inner-land lagoons.

The East Bay Regional Park District and the City now find themselves in emergency mode, trying to secure our shorelines from further erosion. The last time a storm did this much damage was in 2021, when newly placed sand on Alameda Beach was washed back into the Bay, leaving precipitous cliffs on display. East Bay Regional Park District did some dune reinforcements at the time, but Mother Nature reminded us who is boss.
The same scenario has played out again, compromising the shoreline and making upland dunes even smaller.


The park district is now taking measures to shore up the remaining Alameda Beach buffer zone between the water and the street.

New riprap, or rock armor, which is currently being added along the entire corner at Shore Line and Westline drives, will seek to stabilize the slope in this area of highly concentrated waves in order to protect the pump apparatus from potential failure if more land is washed away.

Hardly any of the fencing that is supposed to hold the dune in place remains intact along the beach.

Ironically, the stalled restroom project at Shore Line Drive and Grand Street, which had to go back to the drawing board to meet floodplain standards, was not affected at all by the storm.
This video shows how hard Crab Cove was hit, washing away footing holding up park benches.

Shoreline damage around Crab Cove.
The shoreline at Alameda Point and Harbor Bay Business Park also suffered major damage.
The beach dune next to the Encinal Boat Ramp, which was renovated in 2020 to stabilize the shoreline, is now partially washed away, leaving fence posts tipped over.

And the Bay Trail near the Harbor Bay Ferry Terminal is closed after large chunks of the trail broke away.



Severe weather events that bring a deluge of water in a short amount of time demonstrate how vulnerable Alameda’s built shoreline environment is.
Contributing writer Irene Dieter’s articles are collected at alamedapost.com/Irene-Dieter, and she posts stories and photos about Alameda to her site, I on Alameda.