CAPITOLA — Three months after its much-anticipated reopening, the Capitola Wharf endured its first major test from mother nature and yielded mostly positive results, according to the city’s chief infrastructure official.
After nailing down about a dozen or so slabs of wood decking near its midsection and confirming the integrity of the 167-year-old structure, the city’s wharf reopened Monday after sitting closed for a week. Jessica Kahn, Capitola director of public works, explained that the local landmark was closed early last week in anticipation of the massive ocean swell that snapped off the end of the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf and caused more than $20 million in damage at the Santa Cruz Harbor.
Kahn said that one pile from the Capitola Wharf was displaced and it was because another pile, ripped from the Santa Cruz wharf, drifted over and rattled against one of its many foundational limbs before buckling.
“We feel like this was the first real test we’ve had after we reopened the wharf,” remarked Kahn, adding that her team was “really happy” with the way the new features held up during the atmospheric assault.
Roughly 10 to 12 boards from the Capitola Wharf’s decking were lifted up and out of place during the powerful ocean surge that hit the Central Coast last week. The boards were refastened to the wharf’s foundation early Monday and it is now open to the public. (PK Hattis – Santa Cruz Sentinel)
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Unlike the majority of decking on the 855-foot-long wharf that is fastened to the foundation with screws, the 10 to 12 pieces that were bumped out of place were purposefully nailed in, Kahn explained. When intense wave action rolls through, these loosened boards act as a pressure release valve and help prevent major structural tweaks as the water rebounds against the wharf’s underbelly.
“That’s definitely something we’ve had happen basically since the city has had the wharf,” said Kahn. “That’s not unexpected; that’s something we address more or less every year. So that, for us, isn’t a big deal.”
All of the wharf’s decking and railing was replaced as part of the $10.6 million Capitola Wharf Resiliency Project that was completed this summer. The project, a decade in the making, was shifted into high gear in 2023 after the wharf was snapped in two by another roaring tide and days of torrential downpours. The midsection of the wharf that buckled in 2023 and is most vulnerable to heavy wave action was expanded from 20 feet to 36 feet as part of the reconstruction effort that included establishing 150 new and replacement fiber-reinforced plastic pilings that are much more durable than the traditional timber legs.
“The new piles have held up really well. There is really no damage to them at all,” said Kahn. “We’re very happy with the way they performed in the storm.”
While the wharf in Capitola managed to make it through the recent onslaught relatively unscathed, its northern counterpart, the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf, didn’t fare so well. A roughly 150-foot section at the end of the wharf in Santa Cruz that was under construction collapsed into the ocean days before the Christmas holiday and the coastal structure remains indefinitely closed.
The financial toll to Capitola was relatively minor as well when it came to its wharf, according to Kahn. A few members of the city’s public works staff walked out onto the deck in Monday’s crisp morning air and nailed down the disjointed boards before reopening the local landmark to the public just as the sun was breaking through the misty cloud cover.
