San Pedro Bay is an inlet on the Pacific Ocean coast of southern California, United States. It is the site of the

Port of Los Angeles The Port of Los Angeles is a seaport managed by the Los Angeles Harbor Department, a unit of the City of Los Angeles. It occupies of land and water with of waterfront and adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. Promoted as "America's Port", t ...

and the Port of Long Beach, which together form the fifth-busiest port facility in the world (behind the ports of Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Shenzhen) and the busiest in the Americas. The Los Angeles community of San Pedro borders a small portion of the western side of the bay, and shares the name. The city of Long Beach borders the port on the eastern side of the bay. The northern part of the bay, which is the largest part of the port, is bordered by the Los Angeles neighborhood of Wilmington.

Seabed

Most of the bay is between deep. The seabed near Long Beach has experienced considerable

subsidence Subsidence is a general term for downward vertical movement of the Earth's surface, which can be caused by both natural processes and human activities. Subsidence involves little or no horizontal movement, which distinguishes it from slope move ...

as a result of oil extraction in the Wilmington Field from the 1950s onward. This helped the Port of Long Beach surpass the Port of Los Angeles as the leading port in the United States for a time in the 1980s and 1990s, since the deeper seafloor meant that Long Beach could accommodate ships with deeper drafts than could Los Angeles. Dredging operations related to the construction of a gigantic new marine terminal at the Port of Los Angeles have since made both sides of the bay accessible to even the largest existing container ships. Concerns regarding subsidence increased until Operation "Big Squirt", a water injection program, halted any progression of sinking land in 1960.

Islands

Natural islands in San Pedro Bay include Terminal Island (actually an augmented

mudflat Mudflats or mud flats, also known as tidal flats or, in Ireland, slob or slobs, are coastal wetlands that form in intertidal areas where sediments have been deposited by tides or rivers. A global analysis published in 2019 suggested that tidal fl ...

and Rattlesnake Island), the site of much of Los Angeles' and Long Beach's port facilities, and Mormon Island, the site of an abortive settlement attempt by San Bernardino-based Mormon pioneers in the 1850s.

Land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamati ...

operations by Los Angeles have considerably enlarged Terminal Island, as well as linking Mormon Island to the mainland. Deadman's Island sat at a landmark at the foot of the bay, but was removed in 1928 as part of the effort by Phineas Banning to enlarge the harbor. In 1927 an airport was built on Terminal Island. Four small artificial islands containing

oil well An oil well is a drillhole boring in Earth that is designed to bring petroleum oil hydrocarbons to the surface. Usually some natural gas is released as associated petroleum gas along with the oil. A well that is designed to produce only gas may ...

s (the

THUMS Islands The THUMS Islands are a set of four artificial islands in San Pedro Bay off the coast of Long Beach, California. The THUMS Islands were built in 1965 to tap into the East Wilmington Oil Field. The landscaping and sound walls were designed to cam ...

) are scattered around the bay near Long Beach. The oil drilling equipment itself is masked by tropical landscaping, architectural features and fake high-rise "buildings" in an attempt to improve their appearance from shore. These islands, named Oil Islands Freeman, Grissom, White, and Chaffee, are named for

Theodore Freeman Theodore Cordy "Ted" Freeman (February 18, 1930 – October 31, 1964), was an American aeronautical engineer, U.S. Air Force officer, test pilot, and NASA astronaut. Selected in the third group of NASA astronauts in 1963, he was killed a year ...

, the first NASA

astronaut An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally r ...

to die during flight, and for Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger B. Chaffee, who were killed by a fire during the Apollo 1 mission.

Free Harbor Fight

Angels Gate - San Pedro, Los Angeles, California panoramio

As Los Angeles developed as an economic and trading hub, the need for a deep harbor became apparent. In the late 1890s, the

Southern Pacific Railroad The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the ...

started purchasing large parcels of land in Santa Monica near its terminus, and the Huntington family advocated for a Santa Monica harbor, which would have monopolized Southern Pacific freight. In opposition, the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and a newly formed Harbor League advocated for a harbor to be built in San Pedro, where the Southern Pacific would have competition with Phineas Banning's Los Angeles and Harbor Railroad. The resulting Free Harbor Fight and 1906 annexation of the Harbor Gateway ensured Wilmington and San Pedro would serve as the main port of Los Angeles. It also explains the considerable distance between the harbor and the city's main rail yards, a situation not addressed until the construction of the

Alameda Corridor The Alameda Corridor is a freight rail "expressway" owned by the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority that connects the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach with the transcontinental mainlines of the BNSF Railway and the Union Pacific Rail ...

nearly a century later.

Breakwaters

Three breakwaters extend across most of the bay, with two openings to allow ships to enter the Port of Los Angeles and the Port of Long Beach. The San Pedro Breakwater was constructed between 1899 and 1911 at San Pedro; the Middle Breakwater was completed over the next 25 years, and the Long Beach Breakwater was finished after World War II. The breakwaters provided the ports considerable protection in the 1939 California tropical storm.

Restoration

The Long Beach breakwater is the target of controversy within the harbor towns and Greater Los Angeles conservationist community, with various environmental groups, including the Long Beach chapter of the

Surfrider Foundation The Surfrider Foundation USA is a U.S. 501(c)(3) grassroots non-profit environmental organization that works to protect and preserve the world's oceans, waves and beaches. It focuses on water quality, beach access, beach and surf spot preservati ...

, proposing modifying or removing the breakwater to promote better water flows and a more natural coastal environment at the mouth of the Los Angeles River. This

restoration ecology Restoration ecology is the scientific study supporting the practice of ecological restoration, which is the practice of renewing and restoring degraded, damaged, or destroyed ecosystems and habitats in the environment by active human interrupt ...

-based removal is opposed by waterfront property owners and shippers, who consider that the breakwater provides needed protection from storm damage. A short documentary addressing the issues surrounding the reconfiguration of the Long Beach breakwater is available."Mother Wants Her Beauty Back"
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Seabed

Islands

Free Harbor Fight

Breakwaters

Restoration

See also

References

Further reading