Huntington Beach Urban Forest volunteers seek to bridge the gap

The Urban Forest is probably one of the best-kept secrets in Huntington Beach.

The 2½-acre park, which sits off Ellis Avenue between Goldenwest Street and Edwards Street, has beautiful scenery and wide walking trails.

Although the park may be a secret, Huntington Beach Tree Society founder and president Jean Nagy wants to make it public that her small group of volunteers needs help.

The nonprofit Tree Society is trying to raise funds to build a pedestrian bridge at one particular point of the Urban Forest, where several trails converge.

“That little bridge, everybody would have their picture taken on it,” Nagy said. “Girls would come with weddings and at Christmas. Everybody would come out there to have their picture taken ... There’s nothing there. It’s really not a creek per se, it’s more run-off from the people across the street on Ellis. But if it does rain on all of those hills there, the water from all of those hills across the street funnels into that creek.”

The Tree Society has already put thousands of dollars into the bridge project, Nagy said, including paying $4,000 for a hydrology report last year with the help of the O.L. Halsell Foundation. She also has received a generous donation of boulders, many of which would be used for the bridge’s construction.

A sketch of the proposed pedestrian bridge in the Urban Forest.

(Courtesy of Jean Nagy)

Now the group is turning to the public for help with the bridge’s construction. Donations may be made online at the Tree Society’s website or to Huntington Beach Tree Society, P.O. Box 1269, Sunset Beach, CA 90742.

The funds are needed to clear the stream, stabilize the embankment, finalize the design and construct the bridge. Nagy, who typically works in the Urban Forest three mornings a week, said the Tree Society is hoping to raise at least $30,000.

“Every couple of years my family comes to town, my kids and my grandkids, and we always do a group shot in the Urban Forest,” Huntington Beach Tree Society member Sheila Holliday said. “I’m looking forward to our next one in a couple of years here, when the bridge has been put in. It’ll be super picturesque for that.”

Huntington Beach Mayor Barbara Delgleize has worked with the Tree Society since she was elected to the City Council in 2014, and said she’s a proponent of the new bridge.

“What’s so good about these people is that they’re volunteers, but they don’t mess around,” Delgleize said. “They’re out there every day. I think what they’re doing is terrific. When people discover the Urban Forest, they’ll always go back. A lot of people still don’t know about it.”

Delgleize is familiar with the area in question and noted that it’s not very safe without the bridge.

Visitors cross a temporary, homemade bridge across the creek in the Urban Forest in Huntington Beach. Members of the H.B. Tree Society are hoping to build a permanent, safe and sturdy bridge over the creek.

(Don Leach / Staff Photographer)

“The other problem is, if you do have people hiking around there and they don’t have a stable place to put their feet, it could be an issue,” she said. “The bridge would look cool, and I think it creates a little more safety.”

Though the city continues to work with the Tree Society, it’s not really Nagy’s style to wait around for a green light from the city before moving forward on projects like these.

“I’m at the point where I don’t care anymore,” she said. “If I can get something done to make the city better, I’m like, ‘Yes’ ... I just keep going.”

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