Caltrans is planning modifications to a newly installed fence in Fort Bragg after residents and business owners revolted over blocked ocean views along a scenic stretch of Highway 1.
The $9.5 million sidewalk project, intended to improve pedestrian access and bring walkways into Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, spans nearly the entire Northern California city from the Route 20 intersection to Elm Street. But locals say the real problem is not the sidewalk itself — it is the towering wooden barrier that replaced a low, worn fence that previously preserved views of Noyo Headlands Park and the Pacific Ocean.
“We’re marketing towards being a sea town, but you can’t see the sea. It’s a bit of a buzzkill,” Aiden McFadden, who works at the Seabird Lodge, told SFGATE by phone. McFadden said guests at the lodging business have already begun complaining about the obstruction.
The backlash reached City Hall quickly. City Manager Isaac Whippy said staff reviewed the project permit and discovered the replacement fence was supposed to match the height of the previous one. That finding brought officials back to the negotiating table with the state transportation agency and the property owner.
“Did anyone stop to ask how this substantially higher fence would affect the people who live here or how it would change the view at the entrance to our town?” Mary Rose Kaczorowski, a candidate for city council, wrote in a letter to the editor of the Ukiah Daily Journal, cited by SFGATE. Kaczorowski said the fence has become a blow to Fort Bragg’s identity.
The property where the fence stands belongs to Mendocino Railway, the company that operates the historic Skunk Train, which terminates nearby. Robert Jason Pinoli, the company’s president and CEO, told SFGATE that Mendocino Railway was unaware of the fence height before installation.
Caltrans spokesperson Manny Machado told SFGATE that the agency and the city began working together to address concerns about the new fence after complaints mounted. The planned modifications will bring crews back to the coastal town within weeks.
“We have a timeline for the construction crew to come back to town in the next couple of weeks for fence modifications,” Whippy told SFGATE.
Bonnie Brayton, a Fort Bragg resident, made her position plain in an email to SFGATE. “CalTrans has done a bad thing and it needs to be undone,” she wrote.
The nearly $10 million project had aimed to make the city’s main coastal corridor safer and more accessible. Instead, it has sparked a local revolt centered on a single design choice that residents say has transformed a welcoming ocean gateway into a wooden wall.
