Due to “considerable structural damage,” the city of Berkeley has announced the indefinite closure of its 89-year-old historic municipal fishing pier. Berkeleyside, the Chronicle, and others report that the pier has been closed to car traffic for weeks and is now off-limits to foot traffic as well, meaning the crowds who gathered to walk the pier or, dangling from it, to fish, are nowhere in sight.

The pier will be closed until “further testing and repairs can be made,” Berkeley City Manager Christine Daniel said. The pier is simply deck over concrete beams, all supported by piles driven into the mud of the bay. Steve DeJesse of IDA Structural Engineers in Oakland says that one end of the pier, which was rebuilt in the 1980s, is in “good shape.” But the other, older half — closest to land — dates to the 1950s and is rather dilapidated.

Before a July Fourth celebration, inspectors noticed damage to the structure and banned the trucks that were supposed to assist with the show from driving on it. Instead, the city rented a barge for the occasion.

“There’s widespread cracking... [parts of the pier] are falling off or have already fallen off,” DeJesse said. “It’s hard to see what is going on underneath," he added, calling the deterioration “pretty widespread,” probably the result of a “very aggressive marine environment.”

According to a description on a plaque by the historic structure, “The pier accommodated ferries that carried cars across San Francisco Bay. After big events in Berkeley, such as football games at the University of California, hundreds of cars would back up for hours waiting to board the ferry for the trip back to San Francisco. After the Bay Bridge was completed and opened to automobile traffic in 1936 the pier was converted to recreational use, including fishing.”