SAN CLEMENTE, Calif. – BNSF Railway has resumed freight service on the ex-Santa Fe “Surf Line” between Los Angeles and San Diego past the site of a landslide in San Clemente, the Los Angeles Times reported. BNSF began running two to four trains a day through the area at speeds of 10 to 15 mph, San Clemente Public Works director Kiel Koger told the San Clemente City Council Tuesday. Passenger service remains suspended. “The area that failed on April 27 is still showing some signs of creep and movement,” Koger said. “We’re hoping that the major movement has already occurred and that it’s just going to be minor from here on out.”
Amtrak passenger service and Metrolink commuter train traffic through the area remains suspended until further notice. Amtrak is providing a bus bridge between the stations at Oceanside and Irvine for some of its daily trains. Passenger service continues between San Diego and Oceanside. [See “Surfliner, Metrolink could face another extended stoppage in Orange County,” Trains News Wire, April 29, 2023].
A bowl-shaped chunk of the hilltop slipped away last week at the western edge of the 2½-acre Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens, an estate built in the 1920s. The slide took out part of an ocean-view patio and left a 15-to-20-foot, sheer face of sandy soil at the edge of the buildings, the Times reported.
A firm hired by the city is conducting a geotechnical evaluation that will help determine what action can be taken. Soils throughout the region are sandy and remain saturated from winter rains, which has caused other landslides in San Clemente.
The structures are about 70 feet above the beach and the tracks. Dirt and debris have fallen near the tracks, but the tracks themselves are undamaged. A hillside condominium building below the slide has been evacuated because of soil from the slide pushing against one wall. Most of the units are vacation rentals, and about eight have full-time residents.
The city may need to spend $7 to $8 million to stabilize the slope. Some of the money may be available from FEMA or other state and federal agencies. The landslide occurred less than two weeks after passenger service resumed following a nearly six-month suspension caused by a different slow-moving landslide. The earlier slide occurred below the Cyprus Shore community, nearly two miles south of the present one.
While the railway line is being rerouted inland, a retention wall should be built to secure and preserve the Casa Romantica Cultural Center and Gardens from shifting terrain.
They’ll have to move the RR to more stable ground.