Love Creek facts for kids

Love Creek is a small creek in California. It begins high up, about 1,000 feet above sea level. The creek then flows south through the town of Ben Lomond, California in Santa Cruz County, California. Finally, it joins the San Lorenzo River just south of Ben Lomond. Love Creek runs along the higher ground next to the town's main business area. This means there's a risk of flooding for the businesses nearby.

The Valley Churches United Missions building is located right next to Love Creek, close to Highway 9. This building keeps sand and bags ready to help control floods if the creek overflows.

History of Love Creek

Love Creek is well-known because of a very serious landslide that happened in 1982. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reported on this event.

The 1982 Landslide

In January 1982, a huge rainstorm caused about 18,000 landslides across the San Francisco Bay Area. The most damaging one occurred in the Love Creek area of the Santa Cruz Mountains. A large section of a wooded hillside, about 1,000 feet long, suddenly slid down. It crashed onto homes where people were sleeping in Love Creek Heights. Sadly, ten people were buried by this slide.

The USGS described the landslide as being about 600 meters (2,000 feet) wide and 250 meters (820 feet) long. It was also about 10 meters (33 feet) thick. The huge amount of earth, about 500,000 cubic meters (17.6 million cubic feet), blocked Love Creek. This created a lake about 300 meters (980 feet) long, which flooded several homes.

Land Use and Safety Concerns

Before the landslide, in 1976, officials in Santa Cruz County had planned to hire experts. These experts would use new satellite photos from NASA to map and check the stability of the land. This survey would have helped identify unsafe areas. However, local real estate developers did not want this survey to happen. They worried it would limit their ability to build roads and homes in the mountainous parts of Santa Cruz County. So, the county officials stopped the survey.

A later study was done, but it didn't include checking the ground in person. This meant it wasn't a very accurate survey of the area.

Love Creek had been stable for hundreds of years before people started cutting down redwood trees. This logging and removal of trees continues even today. County officials allowed building roads and homes without fully considering the dangers this created. Many believe this made the 1982 disaster worse.

How Love Creek Got Its Name

Love Creek is named after Captain Harry Love. In 1853, Captain Love was in charge of the California Rangers. Their job was to find a famous bandit named Joaquin Murieta. Later, Captain Love moved to the Santa Cruz Mountains. He built a sawmill on this very stream, which was then named Love Creek after him.

Location and Businesses

Love Creek is located on the west side of the main business area in Ben Lomond. It runs along Highway 9, making it easy to find.

Getting Around Love Creek

You can reach the area near Love Creek by bus. Santa Cruz Metro Transit Bus Route 33 and Bus Route 35 both go to Ben Lomond.

Map Information

You can find Love Creek on the following map from the USGS: