Sedona Sweginnis | Newsroom Manager & Head Editor
February 6, 2026
The glowing sun warms your skin. A light salty breeze brushes your hair out of your eyes to reveal the glittering horizon. Fluffy mounds of sand are soft and comforting beneath your feet. You close your eyes to bask in the extraordinary scene around you, listening to the gentle ebb and flow of the rolling waves, until a harsh screeching cuts through your serenity, terminating your peace and joy with an unceremonious blare of machinery.
After whipping around, the source of the vexation is apparent; not only does the construction on the beach trail interrupt the peaceful ocean-side chorus, but its presence also stains the elegance of the renowned Southern California shoreline with a starling blot of orange. The intricate natural designs within the bluffs and the breathtaking expanse of the Pacific Ocean are rudely obscured by the crude outlines of construction machines, while the lulling ocean sounds are mutilated by incessant drilling and pounding. As put by San Clemente junior Emily Jahed, “the construction on the beach trail is an unwelcome” and visually unappealing interruption that “ruins the natural beauty of the beach.”
Although the people of San Clemente will be grateful for their restored beach trail once the project is completed, citizens grow in unrest and uncertainty that that day will never come when they reflect on the last two years of promised deadlines, during which their beloved beach trail remained imprisoned behind a towering chain-link fence.
The San Clemente beach trail is cherished by walkers and runners throughout south Orange County, however, with an essential portion of the trail held captive, pedestrians are faced with a choice between traversing an Everest of stairs, weaving through neighborhoods, braving the loose sand, or simply turning around and limiting their trek to small back-and forth-movements. Junior and competitive runner Addison Carey explained her dismay at the closing of the bridge on the beach trail as it was her “favorite place to run.” The bridge has been out of commission “since [her] sophomore year, complicating [her] off-campus runs” with her teammates.
Although annoyance can be the initial reaction to construction, this $300 million project promises a revamped bridge and a 1,400 foot catchment by the Orange County Transportation Authority to protect the trail and train tracks from any future landslides like the one that initiated the construction.
In 2024, landslides from the bluffs that overlook the trail invaded the trail and tracks, rendering the bridge between Linda Lane and North Beach unsafe and necessitating this project. The improved and reinforced bridge with catchment protection is projected to finish later this year, mending the severed beach trail and restoring the peace and beauty of the beach.
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