‘Sunken City’ Fenced to Keep Revelers Out

A fence around “Sunken City,” a geologically unstable area along the cliffs near Point Fermin in San Pedro that is popular with teen-agers and other late-night revelers, was completed this week, city officials said.

The Los Angeles City Council ordered the eight-foot-high steel fence built in 1987 after residents complained that the youths kept them awake at night by drinking and playing loud music.

“The fence is up. As of (Wednesday) at 9 a.m. it received the final inspection,” said Julian Jimenez, a maintenance supervisor with the Los Angeles Recreation and Parks Department.

$1.7-Million Project

Kathleen Chan, a project manager for the department, said the $200,000 fence is part of a much larger, $1.7-million project that includes rebuilding a retaining wall at adjacent Point Fermin Park.

The city is rebuilding cliff-side sitting areas and a three-foot-high concrete wall along the southern border of the park, which overlooks the ocean. Most of the work has involved the construction of concrete columns into the cliff below the wall to strengthen it against erosion.

A walkway that runs along the wall and next to the historic Point Fermin Lighthouse is closed and will be reopened when construction is completed in July, Chan said.

But even when the walkway is reopened, the work may seem incomplete since sections of the original, rapidly eroding concrete wall remain on the western side of the park.

Joel Breitbart, the department’s assistant general manager for planning and development, explained that the city had only enough money to rebuild about three-quarters of the original wall.

Breitbart said the department’s request for additional funding to complete the wall was denied. He said the department would seek money for the project again next year. About $1 million will be needed to complete the wall, he said.

The 10-acre Sunken City site has been closed to the public for more than five decades, since the land became unstable and homeowners were forced to move. Today, only the buckled asphalt and the ruins of the street and sidewalks remain.

As of Thursday, Jimenez said, a gate at the end of Paseo del Mar that allows access to Sunken City will be locked at all hours. The gate will be opened only for maintenance and in emergencies.

Holes in Chain-Link Fence

The steel fence extends about three blocks from Point Fermin Park on the west to the end of Pacific Avenue, where a less-sturdy chain-link fence forms the only barrier between Sunken City and the street. In past weeks, people have easily climbed over or crawled through holes in the chain-link fence. This week, however, the fence was repaired.

Officer Randy Childs of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Harbor Division said the true test of the new fence’s effectiveness will come during the summer.

“We have most of the problems during the summer, when most of the kids are out of school and the weather is warmer,” Childs said. “It’s pretty cold out there right now.”