L.A. County floats sand transfer plan for Zuma Beach Play

L.A. County has plans to move sand from Marina del Rey to Zuma Beach. Some day. Maybe. If they can find the money. And if four other beaches don't get to the sand first.

L.A. County last week unveiled plans for a "living dune" and beach widening project at Zuma Beach. The idea is to end the annual sand berm construction at Zuma.

The county wants to use some of the sand that gets dredged out of Marina del Rey to make Zuma Beach wider in front of the lifeguard tower, maintenance yard, and public bathroom buildings at Zuma. Then, sand would be sculpted into little mounds and covered with native plants.

Sand would be brought to a sand depot, proposed for the west end of the beach near Trancas Creek, then distributed on Zuma Beach.

But not Westward Beach — the place where the beach has almost completely disappeared this year.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has decreed that the beach east of Zuma Creek's mouth — what we call Free Zuma and Westward beaches — is a state protected area, and sand nourishment is not allowed.

West of the creek's mouth, from Zuma Creek to Trancas Creek, is different. Fish and Wildlife has declared that section to be a conservation area, not a protected area, and sand is allowed there.

The county says it hopes that dumping sand in front of the lifeguard tower will wash the sand down into the protected area, maybe making Westward Beach a little wider.

No comment yet from the state on this incredible set of rules — preserving Westward Beach by destroying it.

Getting back to the county's proposal for Zuma Beach, there is no funding source or timeline for the sand transport. But Beaches and Harbors says Zuma will have to compete with four other popular L.A. County beaches to get the sand from Marina del Rey. So there may not be much of it.

It could be possible to dredge sand up from the ocean right in front of Zuma. But again, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife is in charge, and they say no local dredging.