MARINA, Calif. _ Ten miles north of Monterey and a world away from Santa Cruz, Bruce Delgado gazed up a towering sand dune. Careful not to step on the beach buckwheat that protects rare butterflies or the sea lettuce that survives only in stable habitats, he wound his way toward the ocean.
At the top, slightly out of breath, he marveled at the sandy beach that stretched for miles along the bay. Big surf broke into rhythmic cusps by the shore. A red-tailed hawk soared over his town of Marina, where despite its name, no dock or pier exists to interrupt this view.
Not much of the California coast feels like this anymore, with no pavement or harbors or parking lots right up to high tide. Home to sharks and coyotes, shorebirds and butterflies, this little town not far from Silicon Valley is a reminder that the beach itself used to be wild.
"It's the best-kept secret. Living in Marina is a choice," said Delgado, a botanist turned mayor who has managed to pull off what many towns have not. "Sometimes when you go jogging on the beach, you see vultures eating dead sea lions. ... There's a lot of nature happening in these dunes."
At a time when Del Mar, Pacifica and other coastal cities are fighting to defend their homes and roads from the rising sea, Marina has embarked on a path less traveled. Here in this Army-turned-university town, residents are learning how to adjust with the ocean as the water moves inland.
Sea walls are forbidden, and sand replenishment projects seem unnatural in a city so proud of its native environment. Officials instead are embracing ideas that have been political suicide elsewhere: Require real estate disclosures for sea level rise, move infrastructure away from the water, work with the private resort in town to relocate its oceanfront property _ a policy known as managed retreat.
This small but lively town of 23,000 says it's fought enough coastal issues over the decades to know that bad ideas must be stopped sooner than later. A controversial sand mine on the beach is finally shutting down after a century of dredging away the coast. Residents are still fighting a large water company trying to build a desalination plant.
With sea level rise, the mere suggestion of making room for the ocean and turning prime real estate into open space has upended other cities up and down the coast _ at least one mayor has been ousted. But Marina is different, a city report declared, and instead will show the state and country how to adapt to a changing planet.
"Marina is such a good test case," said David Revell, a coastal geomorphologist who has advised numerous cities, including Marina, on sea level rise. "Here we have the precedent of a community who understands that ... there has to be enough lead time to get things out of the way _ before it's in the way.
"That is a really powerful message to the rest of California."
