Editor’s note: This article is Great Salt Lake Collaborativea solutions journalism initiative that partners with news, education, and media organizations to inform people about the plight of the Great Salt Lake.
BOMBAY BEACH, Calif. — Candace Youngberg’s feet crunch across a dry playa as she heads to her favorite art installation on the Salton Sea shoreline in Bombay Beach, California. A large handmade metal sign reads “SOS” (an acronym for Save Our Sea).
“The artist created this as a way to bring awareness,” she says, standing in front of it. “Please save our oceans. We want you to save our oceans because there are a lot of people here in Bombay who love the oceans. We don’t want our oceans to disappear. I mean, I don’t want it to be even smaller than it is now, that’s for sure.
Bombay Beach is located in the Imperial Valley. It’s a quaint, eclectic town with a close-knit community, about 40 minutes from Southern California’s famous Coachella music festival and about an hour north of the Mexican border.
There are no gas stations or grocery stores, just one bar and restaurant called Ski Inn, whose melt-in-the-mouth patty was praised by the late food critic Anthony Bourdain. His face is painted on buildings. Bombay is home to approximately 200 permanent residents with a unique history and strong identity.
“I love it here, because there’s a sense of freedom that you don’t get anywhere else,” said Youngberg, who moved to Bombay full-time in 1994. “It’s like a village here. Everybody helps everybody. ” he said.
Brightly colored double-wide trailers line about a dozen streets in town. Some of the lawns have funky art on display. The arid playa is home to the ruins of Bombay Beach, a quirky sculptural installation that prominently displays Youngberg’s beloved SOS sign.
California’s largest lake, the shrinking Salton Sea, is in the background. Resident Tara Satele said that to outsiders, Bombay is often described as a “post-apocalyptic dystopian nightmare.” But “locals are uncomfortable with it.”
This salt lake faces similar degradation to Utah’s Great Salt Lake. California’s lakes, created by chance when the Colorado River flooded in 1905, have undergone major changes. Over the past 20 years, its water levels have dropped more than 10 feet and are now too salty for the ecosystem to survive.
Migratory birds have a hard time finding food. The lack of water leaves miles of exposed lakebed, and extreme winds have been known to kick up dust and snap utility poles. The dust mixed with pesticides and other pollutants from agricultural fields that fills the Imperial Valley is causing high rates of respiratory illnesses such as asthma in surrounding coastal areas.
This is a harsh reality similar to what the Great Salt Lake faces if it does not return to a healthy level of at least 4,198 feet. Thanks to two consecutive wet winters, the number now stands at about 4,195. However, a fruitful winter is not guaranteed.
In the 1950s and ’60s, Bombay was a bustling resort town, much like the now-defunct Great Saltaire Resort in Utah. In its earliest form, Saltaire was once enveloped by the waters of the Great Salt Lake. It was a resort where people could go out on the docks and float in the salt lake. Its current appearance is more than a mile from its original shoreline location, where it was discovered and is now a concert venue atop a crunchy lake bed.
Snowbirds flocked to Bombay during the winter months. Celebrities like the Beach Boys and Frank Sinatra have visited. There were also several gas stations and bars in town.
Youngberg’s roots in Bombay were planted long before 1994. Her grandparents immigrated here in the late 1950s and purchased the property in the 1960s. She remembers a town full of children where there was always something going on. And her grandmother, Eunice Youngberg, was a driving force behind the town’s success. She planned events and played a key role in establishing the Bombay Community Center.
“My grandmother was a huge figure in the community. She was even recognized by the state of California. The state named her like a silver-haired senator from the area. She brought a lot of attention to Bombay. I collected them,” Youngberg said.
However, since the 1980s, the sea began to change. The coastline receded and the population went with it. Youngberg estimates that in his 1980s, Bombay’s population was around 1,000. Since then, the number of people who continue to put down roots there has decreased year by year. Bars, stores, and even the fire station were gone. Youngberg said it could take up to two hours for emergency services to reach the town.
“For a long time, we were forgotten by everyone, even the county residents. We’re still here. We exist. There are still people who live here full-time. We need help,” she said.
Those who still call Bombay home feel a deep connection to this place. Tara Satele is one of them. She came to Bombay in 2022. She previously made six figures, owned a townhouse, and had “a gravy boat to fit my dinner plate.”
“I had a normal life before. I worked on a military base for 19 years. I was a financial accountant,” she said. “Right now I’m living in a single-wide trailer and I’m very happy.”
Satele has lived in Bombay for two years now and has seen the changes firsthand. She remembers that when she first arrived, some of her artwork was underwater, walking on pyramid sculptures and dipping her toes in the lake. She said the art on the playa is a visual representation of the disappearing coastline, like a large wooden swing that was once submerged in water.
“The swing has been moved many times. I think it was late last spring, the two artists who built it decided they weren’t going to move it anymore. They wanted it to go. “The dirt will highlight how quickly the ocean is receding,” Satele said.
Like Youngberg, Satele doesn’t want to see the lake shrink any further. However, she is not convinced that the situation will improve.
“They have been fighting for years about how to fix the ocean. There will never be a solution. There will never be a workable solution they can agree on,” she said.
Some Imperial and Coachella Valley residents say their attitudes toward the Great Salt Lake differ. Lawmakers in Utah took action to prevent further deterioration of the lake. They overhauled outdated water laws to ensure the Great Salt Lake retained its water rights and invested millions of dollars in optimizing agriculture. Most recently, lawmakers cracked down on mineral mining companies that were siphoning water from the lake. There is political will to save the capital’s namesake.
Youngberg has a desire to continue preserving her home and her grandmother’s legacy. She wants to revitalize the town and has led an effort to plant hundreds of trees to provide relief from the scorching heat and, hopefully, dust. She also wants to form a historical society, renovate a community center and rebuild dilapidated housing. And five years from now, she came up with the idea of having a big party when Bombay turned 100 years old.
“That’s Bombay for you. We don’t give up. We solve problems. We find a way,” Youngberg said.
