The crack did not arrive with a dramatic storm surge or a beach evacuation siren. It showed up in concrete.
Pacifica Municipal Pier — the 1,140-foot landmark jutting from Sharp Park Beach — is now closed, and the small cafe at its entrance has been demolished after the city found worsening structural damage where the pier meets land.
The city lists the pier as closed as of June 4, 2026, tying the shutdown to June press releases and an emergency-services order for the pier and an adjacent beach area. The pier, officially the Rev. Herschell Harkins Memorial Pier, was built in 1973.
What made this closure so visual was the location of the damage: near the abutment, the land-side anchor point where a pier stops being a walkway and starts depending on the shoreline to hold together.
NBC Bay Area reported that Pacifica declared a local emergency after new cracks formed and the pier began separating from the shoreline. The same report said the decades-old Chit Chat Cafe, at the base of the pier, was being pulled apart as the structure continued to deteriorate, and that the City Council unanimously approved the cafe’s demolition on Monday night, June 8, according to NBC Bay Area.
KTVU reported that crews began emergency demolition work Tuesday after rapidly widening cracks and shifting concrete raised concerns that part of the structure, including Chit Chat Cafe, could collapse into the ocean. City officials were still awaiting a structural assessment to determine whether the pier can be repaired or rebuilt, KTVU reported.
For now, the public should stay off the pier and out of posted closure areas. The next question is larger than one coffee shop: whether a beloved 1973 pier can be stabilized for another generation, or whether the shoreline has already changed enough that it will never be rebuilt.
