Pier Review Creates Pier Pressure

The Pier Has Maybe Ten Years Left. Here's the Plan

The Hermosa Beach pier has needed serious structural work for years. On Tuesday, March 24, the City Council will get the most comprehensive update yet on where that project stands — and, for the first time, some hard numbers on what the pier's long-term future actually costs.

Public Works Director Joe SanClemente gave the Public Works Commission a preview Wednesday night. The short-term remedial work is one thing, but the long-term prognosis is not good and certainly not cheap.

Where things stand

The city has been working through a detailed structural assessment of the pier for over a year. That report is now finished and includes something that's been conspicuously absent from public discussions so far: a cost-benefit analysis weighing the current repair against what the city will eventually need to spend on the structure long-term. One commissioner asked Wednesday night, only half-joking, how much a new pier would cost.

The target construction start for the short-term work is October or November — deliberately timed to take advantage of the quieter season at the pier. It's a narrow window. Start too late and you're working through winter swells; start too early and you're disrupting the summer. SanClemente was direct about how important hitting that window is to keeping the project on track.

A grant application to the L.A. County Parks and Open Space District came back unsuccessful due to competition for funds, but the city has money in the budget to proceed regardless.

Long-term financial headache

The pier is in worse shape than it looks.

That's the takeaway from the structural condition assessment delivered to the city last month. Based on months of inspections including underwater dive surveys, the report paints a picture of a structure slowly losing its fight with the Pacific Ocean.

The piles and pile caps are in Fair condition. The concrete deck panels you walk on are in Poor to Serious condition, and the deck is now the weakest link. The pier was built in 1965 for 10-ton trucks. It is now restricted to vehicles under 5 tons. If high-priority repairs aren't completed within two years, that rating drops further and sections of the pier start closing.

The Deck Is the Problem

Of the pier's 156 deck panels, roughly 20 are in serious trouble: 13 show fractures from overloading and 7 have significant areas of weak, delaminated concrete. The engineers estimate these panels have lost about half their original capacity.

The damage goes well beyond those worst cases. About 75% of panel undersides have corrosion spalling. Roughly 70% of the tops show spalls and delamination. At 14 locations, the shear keys connecting adjacent panels have failed, meaning those panels are no longer sharing loads.

Repair or Replace ?

The immediate priority, at $3.25 million, is replacing 4 panels and repairing 14 others with fiberglass laminate within 1-2 years. Without it, the load rating drops and parts of the deck close. A second round at $3.22 million covers pile cap and additional deck work over 3-5 years. Beyond that, the engineers are blunt: deterioration will keep accelerating. The Hermosa pier is 60 years old, and concrete marine structures past 50 typically need corrosion repairs on 5-year cycles.

The city asked the engineers to model 45 years of maintenance costs against full replacement, running a scenario for each potential replacement year from 2026 through 2070.

Repairing the existing pier through 2070 would cost a cumulative $210 million in inflation-adjusted dollars. A new pier is estimated at $44.5 million in 2025 dollars. The optimal replacement year is 2032, yielding total costs of $103.9 million through 2070. Any replacement year before 2036 falls within 4% of that figure. After 2039, costs climb sharply.

The recommendation: complete high-priority deck repairs by 2027, begin planning and CEQA review as early as 2026, and break ground on a new pier in 2032.

Other Findings

The Surfer's Walk of Fame plaques between Bents 13 and 18 are actively damaging the pier. Cutting into the deck compromises the concrete cover, and waterproof seals around many plaques have failed. The city has agreed to remove existing plaques and move future ones to the handrails. Bench anchorages are also in widespread disrepair, and the deck appears to dip at Bent 13 in a pattern that may indicate ongoing pile settlement.

What It Means

The engineers have given the city a clear roadmap: fix the deck now, start planning immediately, and build a new pier within the decade. The window of cost-efficient life is about 10 years. After that, every year of delay costs more. Where that money comes from should concern every resident, given the scale of the issue.