Today, thousands of people filled the new, two-mile Sunset Dunes park to celebrate its official opening. Visitors were met with features including play structures for children, ramps for skating and biking, murals, statues and seating at San Francisco’s newest park.
“It’s amazing — I love it,” said Christopher White, the executive director of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, who showed up to the opening day. “It’s been such a great turnout today and filled with so much joy and it’s really exciting… I’m interested in seeing how eventually the park becomes more like a park and looks less like a roadway, but that’s going to cost money — that’s going to take time. I think that this is a great start.”
The park’s development didn’t happen smoothly, facing a lawsuit saying the Upper Great Highway closure was illegal and instances of vandalism on murals. In the months leading up to the opening, residents and local leaders reflected on what this change means for San Francisco’s western edge.
For Reina Tello, a 42-year-old San Francisco native, the Upper Great Highway’s final night as a roadway in March became a family pilgrimage. Just hours before the closure, Tello and her family drove back and forth along the highway, reflecting on memories over decades.
“It felt like I was saying goodbye to an old friend,” Tello said.
Tello’s connection to the Upper Great Highway spans decades, from playing soccer at the polo fields near the coast in Golden Gate Park to driving along the coast after school dances at the Cliff House.
“I’ve definitely made it a point to come out here, not every day — I haven’t been able to do every day — but at least made the intention of being out here as much as possible,” she said in the days before the closure. “I brought my kid with me right now. I want to take one last drive.”
The highway has also been a place of connection for Tello’s family during difficult times.
“When my dad was going through his final transition, he was bedridden for a really long time, and accessibility was really hard to get him out of the house,” Tello said. “This was a drive we would take with him because it didn’t require getting him out of the car. Ocean Beach and right under the Golden Gate Bridge is the closest you can get to water in a vehicle.”
Meanwhile, Joel Schecter, a Sunset resident, preferred what had been in place before the complete closure to vehicles, with the highway open on weekdays and closed on weekends. Schecter now supports the recall effort against District 4 Supervisor Joel Engardio, who supported Proposition K, the ballot measure that closed the highway.
“I know a lot of commuters who need the Great Highway to get to work, and this is going to make travel much more difficult for some of them,” Schecter said. “I know the Great Highway and the beach are slowly eroding and they may need to be closed eventually because of environmental conditions, but meanwhile, that’s not necessary.”
Schecter said that Proposition K did not include funding for developing the park.
“It’s going to be not really a park, but whatever is here now, which is a highway with pavement,” he said. “Perhaps at some point they’ll cover up the pavement or the sand dunes will overtake it, but that will take a while.”
Daniel Montes, a spokesperson for the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department, said that while initial features would be temporary, “the public can expect a robust community process when it comes to creating a more permanent park later down the line.”
Montes also said that traffic improvements in the surrounding area would reduce any impacts as a result of the highway’s closure.
“A lot of thought has gone into ensuring that traffic flow in the Sunset and Richmond and through Golden Gate Park remains,” Montes said. “Key infrastructure projects have been completed in recent months, including repaving Sunset Boulevard and new traffic signals at Great Highway and Skyline Boulevard.”
Jane Lew, a board member of Friends of Ocean Beach Park and chair of its environmental committee, had been eagerly anticipating today’s opening, seeing the transformation as an opportunity to address climate challenges.
“Sea level rise is a big issue, and there’s a way for us to make this park in a way to help build climate resiliency,” Lew said. “If we’re able to plant the native dune grasses into some of the dunes, they help keep the sand in place and it kind of starts being a natural barrier for sea level rise.”
Lew, who lives in the Richmond, acknowledged that many residents in her neighborhood and the Sunset were opposed to the highway closure. She said change can be difficult but believes public opinion is shifting.
“A lot of what I’ve been hearing from westside residents who were initially opposed or voted no, now they’re getting really excited,” she said. “They’re seeing the mural being painted on the Judah bathrooms, they’re hearing all these exciting announcements coming out from Rec and Park, and they’re kind of ready to get on board.”
Lew envisions Sunset Dunes becoming a landmark comparable to New York’s High Line, but with a crucial difference.
“It’s literally on the ocean. That is something so special. We’re on the most western edge of the world,” Lew said. “Something that’s really important to our group is that the ocean remains the star for the park, so we don’t want anything to overshadow the amazing natural elements that are out there.”
Annie Fryman, director of special projects at SPUR, a nonprofit public policy think tank, saw the Upper Great Highway’s transformation into a park as part of a broader movement to reclaim urban spaces for people rather than cars.
“Streets are for people,” Fryman said. “A park with a highway cutting through the middle of it is not a safe place for a kid to learn how to ride a bike, is not a safe place for someone who’s just learning how to roller skate, is not a safe place necessarily for someone who’s in a wheelchair.”
Fryman said that when JFK Drive in Golden Gate Park was closed to cars, “people just flooded to the park who had never been to Golden Gate Park before. We saw kids learning how to ride their bikes. We saw people having community events in ways that they never had been before.”
According to Fryman, SPUR’s research suggested minimal traffic impacts from the road’s closure.
“Sunset Boulevard, which is only a few blocks over, is actually much wider and could potentially provide for a lot higher volume of car traffic than the Upper Great Highway ever could,” Fryman said.
She also said that even when the highway was open to vehicles, it was closed nearly 70 days a year unexpectedly because of sand migration.
In the days before the opening, District 1 Supervisor Connie Chan, who represents the Richmond District, wrote about the impact on residents and businesses in a message to Richmond residents.
“Many Richmond residents and small businesses have been asking me what I can do to help them ease the burden brought on by the closure of the Upper Great Highway,” Chan said. “In the event of a citywide election this year, I will explore a ballot measure to keep Upper Great Highway open to vehicular traffic Mondays through Fridays and closed on the weekends for recreation.”
For Tello, despite her nostalgia for driving along the coast, there was optimism about the park’s future even as she took her final drive.
“I’m excited to see what comes to this part of the city in the form of a park,” Tello said. “I’m excited to see how accessible it is, both through accessibility and making sure it’s accessible by everyone to ensuring that everyone in the city gets to enjoy it.”
On opening day, Emily Seliger, a Sunset resident, brought her son Elio to the new Nature Exploration Area at Rivera Street.
“I’m excited that they’ve put out new things already so quickly, and we’re having a ton of fun with the kids,” Seliger said. “And it’s nice to have more space for them to play outside and be with other kids. Yeah, we’re happy. I hope they keep working on it.”
The interviews with Jane Lew and Annie Fryman were conducted with Dan Hernandez for an audio journalism project.
Gopal Rao • Apr 12, 2025 at 8:09 pm
The band Carry Nation is in fact based in SF.
Neal Wong • Apr 13, 2025 at 10:43 pm
Thanks for the comment. This has been corrected.
Neal Wong
Managing Editor