During COVID when the Oceano Dunes beach was closed to vehicular traffic, I walked the beach every day. I’d never really had the opportunity to see it without having to dodge cars and trucks speeding down the beach. I took pictures of glorious sunsets, the plovers from a distance, of course, and other sea life.
Then the beach was reopened to traffic, and I can’t tell you how many times I was nearly run over by careless drivers or even witnessed people driving in the ocean.
Plastic bottles, broken glass, garbage overflowing the bins. I stopped going to the beach after that and have not returned since. Please keep these beaches for people who enjoy nature and not to those who destroy and pollute it with their garbage and then go home and leave it for others to clean up their messes.
Lydia Rodenhuis
Oceano
This article appears in May 14-21, 2026.
Good news! Most of the beach remains free of vehicular use. Only a limited portion is used by vehicles, and the car-free majority is available to you. Aren’t you willing to share with the far greater number of your fellow Californians who prefer to drive on the beach, or do you want to keep it all for yourself?
Actually, off road mortor sports enthusiasts have more than 140,000 acres of State Vehicle Recreation Areas in California to play and camp in. The problem of doing it at the Oceano dunes is that they disturb and (accidentally) kill endangered species plus damaging environmentally sensitive habitat. Additionally, the community of Oceano has been economically and recreationally repressed for decades by sacrificing its beach as a highway to the SVRA. These are some of the reasons local citizens are supporting Surfrider’s Oceano Vehicle Free Beach Campaign which would create a 2.2 mile vehicle free beach in front of Oceano for locals and tourists. Grover Beach would still be open to street legal vehicles. For more details go to our website https://slo.surfrider.org/oceano-vehicle-free-beach