The North End Is Now the Newest Part of San Clemente's Beach Trail

The ribbon-cutting is set for Linda Lane Park at 9 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 9. Linda Lane is one of the beach access points that Hurricane Marie flooded about a month ago. OCTA scheduled the ceremony to mark the end of its emergency rail work at Mariposa Point and the reopening of the trail segment beside it. Remarks from transportation and community leaders come first, then a ceremonial reopening of the path.

This is the last missing piece of the 2.3-mile Beach Trail, which California State Parks describes as a multi-use route from North Beach to Calafia, open to walking, jogging and biking. For most of the time since early 2024, the trail stopped short at the north end. Now that end has the newest path on the route and a new food hall at its trailhead. The pier, at the center of the route, has become the section still waiting on repairs.

How the Mariposa Gap Closed

An early-2024 landslide damaged the Mariposa Pedestrian Bridge, which closed that part of the path and shut down rail service through town for an extended period. The steel bridge was later removed. OCTA did not rebuild it. Instead it built a flat path that matches the rest of the trail, with boulders on the ocean side and a new catchment wall on the inland side between El Portal and Linda Lane.

The wall runs nearly 1,400 feet. Its job is to keep rocks, soil and debris from the bluff off the tracks. Construction started in September 2025. The Orange County Register reports that the full project cost an estimated $93 million, and about $24 million of that went to the beach trail. Most of the money came from state and federal sources. The trail's share is roughly a quarter of the total. For a segment whose main purpose is protecting a rail line, that is a large share to spend on the path walkers use.

The schedule slipped a little. In January, city officials said the wall and path would be finished by summer. OCTA's Oct. 6 announcement said the trail was expected to reopen the week of Oct. 5, which puts it a few weeks into fall. The south end had its own trouble that same January. A slide near Lasuen Beach covered about 150 feet of path, and crews cleared it within days. City Manager Andy Hall told the San Clemente Times the city moved quickly because the closure was "very traumatic to the trail walkers."

A Trailhead That Now Serves Coffee at 8 A.M.

For years the North Beach end of the trail mostly offered parking. That changed on June 18, when Miramar Food Hall opened in the former Miramar Theatre and Bowling Alley. The project reuses parts of the old building. At the hall's July 1 ribbon-cutting, General Manager Eric Taylor told the San Clemente Times how long it had taken:

"This has been a project that's taken about nine years to get to."

The food hall opened while the Mariposa stretch was still closed, so for its first few months people could not walk the trail south from it. That ends this week. The hall's site lists general hours of 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily and bar hours of 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Egg&Out is open 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Immersion Coffee Co. stays open until 10 p.m. Early local coverage gave slightly different hours, so the hall's own listing is the one to go by. The current roster, grouped by when you are likely to stop:

• Before a morning walk: Immersion Coffee Co., and Egg&Out for egg burritos and sandwiches
• Lighter options after a run: La Vida for salads, wraps, toasts and smoothies, plus Norigiri for Japanese onigiri
• Lunch: Lobster Lab, El Puerto Street Tacos, The Pita, Sidelines Sandwiches, Cosmos Burger, Graciously Thai, It's Allll Rice, RolledUp SC, and Hen Haus, the chicken concept from the founder of Fire Bird Nashville Hot Chicken
• Later in the day: MOTO Pizza, which combines Detroit, New York and Roman styles with Filipino influences, and MOTO Swirl for vanilla soft serve and floats

The hall has one bar inside and one outside.

The Pier Section Is Still Waiting on Hurricane Marie Repairs

The north end has been rebuilt. The middle of the route has not recovered yet. On Sept. 15, San Clemente declared a state of emergency after surf and surging tides from Hurricane Marie damaged beaches and public infrastructure. City Manager Andy Hall listed the damage, which included the loss of a pier pylon and at least 17 braces, plus flooding at Linda Lane and at the beach tunnel at Riviera.

The cost estimates show where each repair stands as of early October:

• The pier: repairs alone could cost at least $300,000. The only related contract the council has approved so far is $116,213 for structural inspection and design services, also approved Sept. 15. That money pays for planning the repair. It does not set a construction or completion date.
• North Beach sand: the council set aside $1 million for immediate sand replacement and directed Hall to find the most sand for the lowest price to truck in. No start or finish date was reported.
• Sand to protect the rail line: separately, OCTA lists adding up to 690,000 cubic yards of sand among its emergency projects through San Clemente, with no placement schedule announced.

None of the city or agency documents reviewed for this post says whether the pier, Linda Lane or the Riviera tunnel is fully open as of this week. The city's Oct. 6 council agenda includes no pier item. Before planning a walk that ends on the pier, check the City of San Clemente's alert center and look at any posted signs at the access point.

The pier also has a business waiting on these repairs. Lauren and Nick Rivard, who run Picnic Café at 174 Avenida Del Mar, are preparing to open Hook & Cook in the former Snack Shack at the end of the pier. The San Clemente Journal reported in August that the planned menu includes lobster rolls, tacos, shaved ice, beignets, breakfast items, coffee and Hawaiian-style hot dogs, along with bait and tackle for anglers. No opening date has been given. Lauren Rivard told the paper the pier has been part of their family's life. On land at the base of the pier, The Fisherman's lists its Galley as open Saturdays and Sundays for burgers, pizza, ice cream and tacos.

The trail now has new food at its north end and planned food at the pier. With Hook & Cook not yet open, the North Beach food hall is the main place to eat along the route this fall.

The First Weekend Without Trains

The path runs right next to the LOSSAN rail corridor, which carries Metrolink, Amtrak Pacific Surfliner, freight and military trains. Since 2021, landslides, beach loss and erosion have interrupted that service several times. The most recent closure followed the Sept. 8 high surf.

The reopened trail's first full weekend lines up with a planned rail shutdown. The Pacific Surfliner's travel advisories list a full corridor closure on Oct. 10 and 11, with no Surfliner trains between San Diego and San Luis Obispo and no bus bridges. Metrolink's schedule for those days was not part of the advisory, so some trains may still run. Even so, Saturday and Sunday will have fewer trains on the tracks than usual, starting at the North Beach trailhead and continuing south along the new Mariposa stretch.

OCTA describes the Mariposa wall as one part of a larger plan. Its Coastal Rail Resiliency Study looks at how to protect about 7 miles of track through Dana Point and San Clemente over the next 30 years. For now, you can walk the trail from the Miramar's coffee counter to Calafia without a gap at Mariposa for the first time in more than two years.

If you are a San Clemente homeowner thinking about how improvements like a reopened trail, a new food hall at North Beach or a repaired pier figure into your property's value, DaileybytheSea can give you a clear, local read on it. Request your free home valuation, and Suzi or Ryan will go over the details with you personally.