Two crews are scheduled to work along the Blackie's Pasture end of Tiburon this fall. One is bringing sand, gravel and cobble onto Greenwood Beach. The other is hauling cattails and silt out of Railroad Marsh. Neither project is meant to leave behind something finished. The Town has written follow-up work into both: monitoring and maintenance on the beach, and a repeat cleanup cycle in the marsh. The fences going up this season are the first round of something the Town plans to keep doing.
That changes what the fences mean for anyone who uses this stretch every morning. The Town treats the shoreline below the Blackie statue as something to tend on a calendar, and it now has a budget, a contractor and a timeline for doing that.
Two sites, one week apart on the council agenda
The Tiburon Town Council approved both contracts at its August 19 meeting. Put side by side, the two projects look like this, with dates as the Town scheduled them in August:
| Greenwood Beach / Brunini Beach | Railroad Marsh | |
|---|---|---|
| Contractor | Goodfellow Bros. LLC of Livermore | McNabb Construction Inc. |
| Contract | $468,983 | $274,743 |
| Council vote | 3-0 | 4-0 |
| Paid for by | A $1.5 million California State Coastal Conservancy grant from 2024 | Town budget, $350,000 allocated for fiscal year 2026-27 |
| What moves | Coarse sediment and cobble brought in | 1,500 tons of vegetation and 300 tons of sediment taken out |
| Scheduled window | September 1 to November 20 | Mid-September through October |
On those dates, October is the one month when both crews could be working at once. As of October 10, the Town had not posted an update confirming either project's progress, so treat the windows as the plan, not a report on where things stand.
What's being built on the beach
Greenwood Beach sits on the northern shore of Richardson Bay. Audubon's project page puts the restoration at about 1.4 acres of shoreline at Blackie's Pasture Park. Tiburon's Parks & Recreation Master Plan groups Greenwood Beach, Brunini Beach and Brunini Marsh together as one area directly next to the pasture.
The work started earlier than many people realize. In a March 16 notice, the Town said crews would build a sediment-retention "drift sill" between March 23 and 26 and bring in soil and rock to stage near the water. Small plants went into that drift sill, and Audubon's project page asks park users not to walk on it or take its rocks and cobbles. If you've wondered about the low band of rock along the waterline since spring, that's what it is. It holds sediment, and it's already planted.
The fall phase covers everything else. According to the Marin Independent Journal, the Town will remove debris and asphalt, restore beach, wetland and transitional habitat, and plant native vegetation. The coarse sediment won't be shaped into a finished beach. Crews will place it along the shoreline, and waves will spread it into a natural beach profile over time. More cobble salt-marsh drift sills are meant to hold that sediment in place without stopping its natural movement.
Audubon's description of the design adds more detail: a mixed sand-and-gravel beach, restored salt marsh, native plants on the backshore and in the marsh, eroded banks regraded and held with native plants that trap sand, and large woody debris. The page includes a rendering of how the site should look about three years after construction. That three-year horizon is the clearest sign of how this beach is supposed to work. When the fences come down, the beach will still be taking shape.
Why the Town chose sand over boulders
The usual way to stop a shoreline from eroding is riprap or a seawall. This project tries to show that a more natural approach can work instead. The exchange at the August meeting was brief:
"I understand that it's considered superior to boulders and rocks?" Councilmember Alice Fredericks asked. "Absolutely, that is correct," said David Eshoo, public works engineering manager.
Eshoo also called Greenwood Beach a pilot. The Town may use the same approach in other places. That matters beyond this one beach. In June, Tiburon started a shoreline adaptation plan that will look at infrastructure, environmental resources and public-access areas. The planning process is expected to run until January 2028. The beach next to Blackie's Pasture is the test case that will be in hand while that plan is written.
A beach that waves reshape needs ongoing care. Eshoo said that after the November 20 completion date, "there will be additional establishment periods, monitoring and maintenance work." So November 20 marks the end of construction, not the end of the Town's work on this shoreline.
The marsh behind Town Hall, and the frog that stopped the work
Railroad Marsh is easy to miss even if you walk past it every day. The Town describes it as sitting behind the Library, Town Hall, Chase Bank, CVS and the Marsh condominiums. It's one of the Town's retention ponds, where stormwater collects during heavy rain. Over time it has filled with cattails, other introduced plants and sediment, which reduces how much water it can hold. The contract calls for removing 1,500 tons of vegetation and 300 tons of sediment. By weight, plants make up five times as much of what's coming out as silt does.
The marsh also has a resident that shaped the schedule. Tiburon began this work a couple of years ago and had to stop when a red-legged frog turned up. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists the species as threatened. Before restarting, the Town worked with federal and state agencies on biological studies, surveys and mitigation to get permits. Mayor Jon Welner asked where a frog would go if crews found one. Eshoo explained the state's rule: stop work, capture the frog and move it to a part of the same habitat where no work is happening. The project budget sets aside about $25,000 for relocations if they're needed.
This isn't the first fall the marsh shoreline has been closed. A Town notice dated September 29, 2025 said the shoreline would not be accessible during a cleanup scheduled for October 2 through 15 of that year. The Town has also laid out what comes next:
- Smaller maintenance projects in the area about every other year.
- A larger project again in five to six years.
That's the clearest version of the pattern. The marsh has a written cycle, and this October is one stop on it.
Getting around the work this fall
Both sites belong to a larger system. The Master Plan treats Blackie's Pasture, McKegney Green, South-of-the-Knoll and the Old Rail Trail as parts of Richardson Bay Lineal Park. That's why work on one edge of the pasture can affect the whole morning loop.
For Greenwood Beach, the Town plans to close the construction areas on the beaches while work is underway. Eshoo also said trucks and equipment will drive through parts of Blackie's Pasture to reach the site. He described the approach this way: "The Town's intent is to maintain public access to as much of Blackie's Pasture and the surrounding trail system as practical, while restricting access to the active construction and staging areas." The Town has not published a detour map or a list of trail closures for this fall. The fences on site are the most reliable guide to where you can and can't go on a given day.
None of this touches the bronze horse at the center of the pasture. According to Destination Tiburon, Blackie lived in that field for 28 years, which is how the place got its name. Artist Albert Guibara made the life-size sculpture, and it went up in June 1995 with support from the Tiburon Peninsula Foundation. The horse stays as it is. The shoreline behind it, from the drift sills to the marsh behind Town Hall, is what will keep changing.
If you're curious how Tiburon's approach to Richardson Bay could affect the properties near it over time, I'm happy to share what I'm tracking. Rick van der Wal follows this shoreline closely and welcomes a conversation whenever it's useful. Let's Connect.
