Building with nature: Can reviving a marsh save this California town from sea level rise?
In 1872, San Luis Obispo’s historic harbor—already choked with sea-level rise-dwarfing industrial factories—was still two or three feet lower.
In 1882 San Luis Obispo’s historic harbor—already choked with sea-level rise-dwarfing industrial factories—was still two or three feet lower.
In 1882, San Luis Obispo’s historic harbor—already choked with sea-level rise-dwarfing industrial factories—was still two or three feet lower.
“We were at sea level when we settled here but there were no trees or trees in the way,” said San Luis Obispo Mayor Mike O’Neill. “I told the citizens that if they would build something with nature we could save their harbor. And we had a plan.”
It involved filling in the piers and piling them up with boulders, trees, and grasses, topped by the grasses of the surrounding marsh. The “Save Our Harbor project” was a grassroots effort of the city’s parks department, a nonprofit environmental group, and a handful of citizens and fishermen who had been working with the South Coast Conservancy to protect their bay since 2008.
They called the project the “Save Our Marsh Project,” and they had a plan.
“It was to fill in the piers, to turn them into marshes, and to raise and plant the trees, shrubs, and grasses that would grow to the surface,” O’Neill said. The marsh would help protect the piers from damage by waves, and by keeping stormwater out of the harbor, making it a better place to live and work.
“It was an incredible project,” said O’Neill. “It was basically a small-scale version of what is commonly built in the bay.”
And the city got the funding it needed.
San Luis Obispo’s Save Our Harbor project has been in the works for years.
“The big issue that emerged was people couldn’t afford to put water in their homes,” said O’Neill.
“If you think about what is happening with sea level, the only things that don’t get more expensive are the services on it