San Diego Bay Gets New Habitat-Boosting Concrete Shoreline

Three football fields' worth of specially textured concrete is about to line parts of San Diego Bay, designed not just to hold back waves but to create habitat in nooks shaped like natural tide pools. The Port of San Diego is installing 1,060 linear feet of this habitat-focused shoreline armor at two bay locations after years of testing showed it dramatically out-performed ordinary rock riprap at supporting marine life.

The material, called ECOncrete COASTALOCK, is built to do double duty: stabilizing the shoreline while creating habitat that mimics natural tide pools, according to the Port of San Diego . In a two-year pilot project that launched in 2020, the units doubled species richness and abundance, increased native biodiversity, and produced twice the biomass compared to conventional shoreline armoring, the port reports. 10News also reported on the project, which the port has described as a success.