Tamarack State Beach has lost so much sand that the parking lot is now fenced off to pedestrians, and state officials have hired a coastal engineer to plan repairs.
The state-owned lot, popular with surfers and families, has been closed to vehicles since early September after high tides and storm-surge waves washed away chunks of asphalt, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. State Parks staff fenced off the lot to pedestrians as well over the weekend of Oct. 10-11, Carlsbad City Manager Geoff Patnoe said in an Oct. 15 update.
State Parks hopes to finish the repair work by the end of December, Patnoe said. State Parks Lt. Sean Homer gave the same timeline to the Carlsbad Environmental Sustainability Commission, the Union-Tribune reported.
The beach between Tamarack and Pine avenues has eroded down to cobblestones at the base of the seawall. The beaches are the narrowest they have been in years, the Union-Tribune reported.
Carlsbad declared a local emergency on Sept. 9 to expedite repairs to erosion threatening Carlsbad Boulevard, also known as historic Highway 101, the Union-Tribune reported.
Amber Martinez, a fourth-generation Carlsbad resident, told the city's Environmental Sustainability Commission that powerful waves are stripping away the shoreline, the Union-Tribune reported.
Curren Ortez, a Sage Creek High freshman who has surfed since age four, told The Sage, the school's student newspaper, that he has noticed a major change at Tamarack.
"The waves were smaller before, but now they have gotten larger, making the rip currents stronger," Ortez said.
The high surf has washed away sand, and to Ortez, the beach seems taken over by water and rocks, hurting locals who try to surf, The Sage reported.
Aaron Sottile, a Calavera Hills science teacher and surf club coach who lives in Oceanside, described a similar shift. When he moved to Oceanside in 2005, he could ride his bike on the sand at low tide all the way to the pier. That is no longer possible, he told The Sage. Sottile said Tamarack's sand loss is "making headlines" and warned that the upcoming El Niño season will likely bring more erosion.
The erosion is part of a broader pattern along the California coast. Warmer El Niño temperatures have fueled 13 named storms and five hurricanes in the Central and Eastern Pacific since late August, according to The Sage.
State Parks owns and manages six of the seven miles of coastline in Carlsbad, including Tamarack, Patnoe noted. The city controls about one mile. That means the city cannot lead repairs on its own.
Carlsbad's beaches rely largely on sediment dredged from the Agua Hedionda and Batiquitos lagoons for replenishment. The Agua Hedionda lagoon was last dredged in early 2025, so another round is unlikely for two to three years, the Union-Tribune reported.
