On the afternoon of September 26, a band sang sea shanties near Judah Street. Someone hoisted a flag up a mast, and children broke open a piñata shaped like a Champagne bottle. That was the opening of Shipwreck Cove, the first and only playground along the two-mile length of Sunset Dunes. The ship comes with a story about "The Sandpiper," a made-up 19th-century sailing vessel that broke apart on Ocean Beach. Kids follow it up a plank to the mast, climb a rope ladder to the crow's nest, and dig in the sand for treasure.
The ship has a permit that runs for one year. That short term describes the whole park this season. Sunset Dunes heads into its second winter with almost everything on the promenade installed as a trial: the playground, the dune grass, the signs that divide the paths and the free weekly programs. The permanent design is still being studied. If you live a few blocks from the Great Highway, the way you use the park this winter is part of the record the city is collecting.
A Playground Built to Be Measured
Shipwreck Cove is 300 feet long and 30 feet wide. It fills the strip between the pedestrian promenade and the bike path for most of the block between Judah and Kirkham. Something Labs designed it with contributions from CMG Landscape Architecture. Something Labs is a collective of engineers and builders who make exhibits at the Exploratorium. Rec and Park's announcement lists 10 wheelchair-accessible and ADA-accessible play structures. The San Francisco Chronicle reported that the first phase of construction happened in the Something Labs shop at Pier 19. The crew built the ship from recycled cypress, eucalyptus and redwood, all from trees cut down during city projects in Golden Gate Park. A fundraiser drew $800,000 from 1,000 individual donors.
Lead designer Sam Haynor described the idea to the Chronicle during a preview tour:
"The design loosely plays out a story of rebuilding after a shipwreck."
The permit explains what the playground is for. In July, Rec and Park said the pilot would gather "real-world, interactive feedback from park users" to inform the planning process it started in 2025. General Manager Sarah Madland said, "We'll learn what works, what families love, and what they want to see in the future." According to the Chronicle, the one-year permit could be extended indefinitely. The sand play areas also do a second job. They give children somewhere to dig other than the dune habitat west of the promenade.
The Third Planting Season Started Earlier
Those dunes are the park's other trial, and the city has already revised it once. Dune grass has to be planted in the rainy season to survive. Rec and Park's one-year report, published October 21, gives figures for the first two seasons. In the pilot planting, January to February 2025, 100 volunteers put in more than 1,500 dune grasses. In the second season, November 2025 to March 2026, 200 volunteers planted more than 950 and laid brush matting to protect them. The department says it learned three things: plant earlier to catch more rain, space plantings closer together, and use brush matting to shield new grass from sand and wind.
This season's calendar follows those lessons. The Friends of Sunset Dunes calendar scheduled a Saturday, November 7 session at Judah to lay brush protecting newly planted grass. That is work on the dunes earlier in the season than last year's November-to-March window. The next session is Saturday, November 14, from 9 a.m. to noon at Judah, harvesting and planting native dune grass. Volunteers sign up through Surfrider. Rec and Park runs the program with the National Park Service, Surfrider Foundation, the San Francisco Estuary Institute, Friends of Sunset Dunes and the California Academy of Sciences.
Who Is on the Promenade on a Weekday
The visitor counts help explain how the calendar is built. In its first year, Sunset Dunes logged more than 1.7 million visits. Rec and Park's report puts the average at 3,800 visits per weekday and 7,200 on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays. Weekdays still accounted for 53 percent of all visits, which the department reads as regular daily use by neighbors. Twenty-eight percent of visitors came from the two adjacent Outer Sunset zip codes. A busy Sunday draws almost twice the weekday crowd, but most of the park's year happens on ordinary weekdays.
The free programs that Friends of Sunset Dunes posts cover both kinds of day. One is new for 2026: a Chinese Community Dance class every Wednesday at 11 a.m., taught in Cantonese, at the Irving Activity Studio. Here is the published schedule from publish day through mid-December. The organizers note that events sometimes move or get canceled.
- Saturday, November 14, 9 a.m. to noon. Dune Revegetation at Judah.
- Saturday, November 14, 10:30 to 11:15 a.m. Zumba and Shake the Fog at Irving, a 45-minute class.
- Every Wednesday, 11 a.m. Chinese Community Dance at the Irving Activity Studio.
- Thursday, December 3, 4 to 6 p.m. Acoustic Happy Hour at the Noriega Sunset Lounge.
- Sunday, December 6, 2 to 3 p.m. Chair Yoga at Irving, part of the first-Sunday series.
- Saturday, December 12, 10:30 to 11:15 a.m. Zumba and Shake the Fog at Irving.
- Sunday, December 13, noon to 2 p.m. 2nd Sunday Serenades, live music at Judah.
- Sunday, December 13, 1 to 3 p.m. Community Cleanup with Refuse Refuse SF and the Civic Joy Fund. It starts at the Taraval lounge, on the ocean-side lanes just south of the hammocks. Pickers, bags, gloves and vests are provided.
At Sloat, the south end has its own draw. The skate area has a bank, a quarter pipe and an island feature, next to the bike pump track and skills course. If you are mapping out a longer coastal weekend, our guide to San Francisco's parks and waterfronts links this stretch with the rest of the west side.
What the November Ballot Measure Covered
Proposition G was on the November 3 ballot. The city's official voter pamphlet says it would close the park from Monday at 4 a.m. to Friday at 6 p.m., except on weekday holidays, so the Upper Great Highway could reopen to private vehicles. The pamphlet adds that the City would first need the required approvals, including any Coastal Act permits. The voter information pamphlet has the full digest and legal text. The Chronicle reported that Shipwreck Cove could be taken down and removed if the measure passed.
Under the measure's own terms, the weekend and holiday hours stay with the park in every case. The second-Sunday music, the first-Sunday yoga and the Saturday planting all fall inside those hours. The weekday programs, including the Wednesday dance class and the Thursday happy hour, fall inside the hours the measure addressed.
The Permanent Park Is Still Being Planned
Behind the trial runs, the city is working on the permanent design in stages. Rec and Park's community survey ran from July 19, 2025 to January 19, 2026. Basic park amenities such as restrooms and trash cans were the single most requested category. Here is where each piece stood in the one-year report:
| Element | Status in Rec and Park's October 2026 report |
|---|---|
| Hammocks, benches, 13 trash cans, two drinking fountains, public art | Interim improvements installed during the first year |
| Park Zone on the west side, Multi-Use Zone on the east | Signs installed August 2025 |
| Mobility and Access Improvements Project | Approved March 2026; scheduled to run from late 2026 into 2027 |
| Technical studies, including a Public Life study and initial cost estimates | Paid for by a $1 million California Coastal Conservancy grant; expected to finish late 2026 |
| Vision Process | Planned for 2027, after the studies |
The Mobility and Access project is the part neighbors will see first. Today, the park's accessible entrances are at Judah, Taraval, Lincoln and Sloat. The project adds a new accessible entrance at Noriega, with rebuilt curb ramps and pathways. It also adds permanent signs separating bikes and pedestrians, plus new bike and crosswalk striping. As funding allows, it will add more seating, upgraded drinking fountains and grab bars in the restrooms. On July 28, the Board of Supervisors approved a grant from the California Department of Parks and Recreation to help pay for it. For the wider context of the avenues around the park, our guide to the Richmond and the Sunset covers the blocks behind the dunes.
The studies come first, then the Vision Process in 2027. By then the city will have a full winter of data on how people used a playground with a one-year permit and a third season of dune grass planted earlier than before.
Brandi Mayo brings an architect's eye to how public space shapes the streets around it. As Sunset Dunes goes from interim pieces to a permanent design, she follows each step closely. If you'd like to talk about the blocks along the Great Highway, or how changes like these affect a home's setting, Brandi Mayo is glad to share what she's seeing. Work With Brandi.
