Avila Structural Engineering, Inc.

10/14/2026

The Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing — $114 million to get mountain lions, bobcats, and deer safely across 10 lanes of the 101. About $540K per foot, against roughly $170K per foot for the Long Beach bridge. Just over three times as much per foot. Why? Builders and engineers — what drove the price? 👇

📍 Agoura Hills, California — DM for project inquiries


Photos: Christopher Aragon, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

10/13/2026

POV: you’re on a boat under the Long Beach International Gateway Bridge 🌉

515-ft towers. 1,000-ft main span. 205 ft of clearance — the tallest cable-stayed deck in America.

It replaced the Gerald Desmond Bridge in 2020, and it’s engineered to survive the earthquake the old one couldn’t. Its joints can move 6 feet in any direction.

$1.5B of structural engineering, floating over the Port of Long Beach.

📍 California — DM for project inquiries

10/11/2026

These caisson cages are likely going in the ocean — and they’re not epoxied. They’ve been sitting by the water and they’re barely rusted. Regular black bar would be orange by now.

Not epoxied, not rusted — what coating is this? 👇

📍 California — DM for project inquiries

10/10/2026

Tropical storm swells are pounding this Malibu seawall — and we’re doing the engineering to rebuild the fire-damaged property behind it. The job now: fix the seawall before the ocean takes the existing foundation we’re trying to preserve.

This is what coastal engineering looks like in real time. 🌊

📍 California — DM for project inquiries

10/08/2026

10/04/2026

Hip roof framing with 4 hips. Trying to frame four big LVL hips into one point would be a mess of compound cuts and hardware. A steel hub at the peak gives every hip a clean place to land and bolt off. 🏗️

10/01/2026

3 existing houses on one lot in Oxnard. When we’re done there will be 7 homes. On a multifamily lot you can add more ADUs, so this one gets a garage conversion, a new ADU and a duplex. 🏠🏠🏠

09/30/2026

Some of the cast-in anchor bolts for the ledger landed right where the joists go, in the middle of the hanger. The fix: notch the web just enough to get the joist in, then add 2x blocks on both sides to reinforce it, so there’s no loss of shear strength. Easy fix, and the whole floor went in in a day. 🏗️

09/28/2026

You asked why we hung the joists on ledgers instead of setting them on the sill. No grading plan, hillside lot, nobody knew where finished grade would end up. This keeps the framing away from the dirt, and once the joists are in, they’re done. No blocks, no clips in every bay. 🏗️

09/25/2026

One house. Three units. 🏠🏠🏠

Our client bought this 2,600 SF rental, and we’re converting it into three separate homes: the main house, an ADU carved out of part of the existing house, and a JADU in the garage.

California law now allows an ADU and a JADU on a single-family lot, so one property can house three households without building anything new. Converting existing space is usually faster and cheaper than new construction, but every wall, opening, and fire separation has to be worked out on paper first.

Follow along as this one goes from one house to three.