Redondo Beach About Town – Mayor’s State of the City on Friday
Mayor’s State of the City
Fri., Feb. 22 at 7 p.m.
Mayor Bill Brand will once again present his 2019 State of the City address on Friday, Feb. 22, at 7 p.m. at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center. This is the second year he’s elected to hold a State of the City address in the evening, separate from the traditional morning annual address, often sponsored by Redondo’s business community.
BCHD Free Fitness Weekend
The Beach Cities Health District’s annual Free Fitness Series kicks off this weekend, leading to a full week of free exercise classes at gyms and fitness studios throughout the Beach Cities. Classes for all fitness levels will be available at 18 local gyms, including BCHD’s AdventurePlex and Center for Health and Fitness. For more information, visit BCHD.org/freefitness.
Sinkhole opens under Artesia Blvd.
A sinkhole, at least eight feet deep and stretching more than 22 feet below the pavement, closed Artesia Boulevard in front of Mira Costa High School through the weekend, starting Thursday afternoon.
“I’m hoping it’s done within three days,” Manhattan Beach Public Works Director Stephanie Katsouleas said at the time.
The sinkhole appeared in the median of Artesia Boulevard between Goodman Avenue and Ford Avenue shortly after 3 p.m. Roads were closed in both directions shortly thereafter.
“There is void space under the pavement,” Katsouleas said. “Looking north, the hole goes at least a lane, lane and a half — about 12 feet back under the pavement,” and approximately 10 feet under the road on the south part of the street.
The hole, estimated to be eight to 10 feet deep, opened over a pipe that drains water from Manhattan Beach and Redondo Beach catch basins into the Wylie Sump stormwater basin, south of Mira Costa High School.
The bottom of that corrugated metal pipe, which connects the catch basins to the sump, appears in photos taken by city crews to have rusted away. Water leaking from the pipe may have eroded the surrounding soil, according to Redondo Beach Public Works Director Ted Semaan.
It wasn’t clear how old this particular pipe was, though crews on the scene identified that it had been in city plans since before 1968.
“We’re glad it was a soft spot in the median where it showed up, before the weight of a vehicle compromised the asphalt,” Semaan said.
Artesia reopened to traffic on Monday.