SAN CLEMENTE : Highway Closed for Excavation on Bluffs
After several delays, a mile-long section of El Camino Real was closed Monday as work crews began heavy excavation work on the unstable bluffs edging the coastal highway.
City officials say the north-south artery into the city will be closed for up to a month as 310,000 cubic feet of earth are removed from the crumbling cliffs.
The highway was closed during February when city workers noticed that the bluffs were riddled with large crevices.
The closure created traffic jams as motorists looked for alternate routes and merchants located near the barricaded highway complained that their businesses suffered.
City Manager Michael W. Parness said crews on the project will work six days a week, 12 hours a day until it is completed.
The project is expected to cost the owner of the area above the highway, the Lusk Co., a development firm, about $2 million.
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