Great Highway Park will be on the ballot this fall!
Today, Supervisors Joel Engardio and Myrna Melgar, along with Matt Dorsey, Rafael Mandelman, and Dean Preston, submitted a ballot measure to turn the Great Highway into a permanent full-time park. The measure will be on November’s ballot. We’re fully supporting it and already mobilizing!
The measure asks voters to approve turning a 2-mile stretch of San Francisco’s Great Highway from Sloat to Lincoln into an oceanfront park. During the pandemic San Franciscans embraced what we lovingly dubbed the “Great Walkway.” Since August 2021, a pilot project has been in place allowing for weekend use as a park, and through the work of neighborhood group Friends of Great Highway Park, community events like the Great Hauntway have drawn citywide visitors and attention to the park.
Over the past 4 years, the Great Highway park and promenade has drawn more than 3 million visitors – attracting nearly 10,000 people every weekend, making it the city’s third most visited park.
We’re thrilled to support this measure alongside Friends of Great Highway Park, and applaud the Supervisors for their leadership and vision for the future of San Francisco’s public spaces. San Francisco kids and families deserve easy access to safe open spaces for recreation across the city, from Ocean Beach to Downtown.
The new park will allow for permanent infrastructure improvements along the coast. Everything from seating with ocean views, children’s play areas, accessibility improvements for people with disabilities, and separate space for dogs could be part of the park. We know from experience pushing strollers and supervising biking children that the flat, paved promenade allows people to enjoy the coast in ways not possible on the beach itself. If the ballot measure passes, there will be a full community design process to determine how to incorporate all of these elements into the park.
We’re also excited to support this measure now because the southern portion of the Great Highway (south of Sloat Boulevard) is already slated to close to vehicle traffic due to coastal erosion and rising seas. Meanwhile the Upper Great Highway (from Sloat to Lincoln) has become unreliable to commuters and expensive to maintain. It currently closes up to 65 times per year due to sand accumulation, and sand clean up is estimated to cost up to $1.7M per year in the future.
Supervisors Engardio and Melgar have also been working with SFMTA on plans to improve traffic flow from the Richmond District to Sunset Boulevard, with new traffic signals to replace stop signs on Lincoln and at Skyline, should this measure pass. SFMTA estimates this route will add 3-5 minutes to travel times at peak hours.
We’ll share more about the campaign and how you can support as we get ready to mobilize. We can’t wait to work with you to pass this important measure for the future of our parks and public spaces this fall!
