Los Angeles Beaches Could Join the National Park System — With Endangered Species in Mind

A federally mandated study is evaluating whether a new national park is needed in California, but it is not a pristine natural area. It’s along the crowded beaches of Los Angeles.

“The purpose of this bill is to evaluate, with public input, whether further boundary changes would help our community preserve and enhance natural and scenic resources with federal support,” said Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Los Angeles). Discover. “This is the first step in securing more federal resources.”

Areas under consideration for management by the National Park Service (NPS) would include Will Rogers State Park to the north, extending to Torrance Beach. This would not include the Palos Verdes Peninsula, but would include the San Pedro Beach area on the other side of that peninsula. This would also include the interior area along Ballona Creek, up to the Baldwin Hills.

These areas encompass many of Los Angeles’ iconic coastal areas, such as Venice and Manhattan Beach. The included areas are currently administered by a hodgepodge of regulatory agencies, including Los Angeles County and State Parks.

The study committee is currently seeking public comment, but some environmentalists are skeptical that the designation is necessary.

“I don’t see a compelling rationale and I see some concerns, particularly around access and clarity of local control,” said Karen Martin, co-founder of the Beach Ecology Coalition and a retired professor at Pepperdine University in California. Discover.

Learn more: Your guide to staying safe when visiting national parks

A possible national park on the beaches of Los Angeles

The push to protect parts of Los Angeles began with the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserve, a parcel of state-owned land at the mouth of Ballona Creek, sandwiched between Venice and Los Angeles International Airport.

Marcia Hanscom, director of Los Angeles Coast Forever! — a coalition of conservation activists — and others worried that the state wasn’t doing enough to protect this patch of land, which is home to several sensitive species like the federally threatened western snowy plover and the El Segundo blue butterfly, an endangered species found in only a few areas of coastal Southern California.

“It’s a very different coastal wetland than anything we have in Southern California,” Hanscom said. Discover.

She and her colleagues believed the state park, which was adjacent to a gas storage area, would receive better protection and funding through NPS involvement. Initially, they simply wanted to expand the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, an NPS area that includes the beaches of Malibu, along the coast to include the Ballona Wetlands.

She connected with Lieu and the idea grew to expand down the beach to Torrance. Lieu first introduced the bill in 2016. Section 634 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 was approved at the very end of 2022 and ultimately ordered a resource study to begin the process of potentially designating Los Angeles beaches as a national park.

What’s unique about Los Angeles beaches?

These beach areas, which include Pacific Palisades and Venice Beach, support important ecosystems and are important for human well-being and cultural value. They also help provide a buffer zone of safety to the city from waves and storm surges.

“They help dampen the waves, protect the city, filter the water coming off the land,” Martin said.

Ecologically, species such as the western snowy plover and the federally endangered California least tern nest on these beaches. Unique fish species, the California grunion, even come to spawn on the sand during their breeding season, and seals and sea lions sometimes come to these beaches.

But these areas are heavily used by humans – much more so than adjacent areas such as the coast of the Palos Verdes Peninsula, which are overlooked and arguably more naturally preserved.

“It’s almost gerrymandering,” Martin said. “It’s just interesting that it happened that way.”

Hanscom agrees that the Palos Verdes Peninsula should have been included, connecting the entire coast from Los Angeles as a potential national park or recreation area to San Pedro Beach.

Will federal protection help Los Angeles beaches?

The areas considered already benefit from a certain degree of ecological management and protection. Some are protected as state parks, while others are protected by municipal regulations. Martin said Discover that the Bay Foundation has already restored sand dunes in places like Manhattan Beach and Dockweiler Beach, for example, by planting native plants to create wildlife habitat and prevent sand erosion. Additionally, the Beach Ecology Coalition of which she is a member works with the Bay Foundation and other regulatory entities to improve ecological beach management.

“This is not something that is mismanaged or neglected,” Martin said.

Overall, Martin and others are primarily concerned about the complex regulatory framework that could be involved in turning these beaches into a national park. She worries what this could mean for beach access: Will beachgoers be charged, as is the case when entering national parks, for example? And how will national park designation impact fishing off beaches, piers or the coast? Will concerts and surf tournaments held on Los Angeles beaches be affected? How will such a park be managed, given the Trump administration’s budget cuts to the NPS?

“It’s something new and it hasn’t been widely publicized,” Martin said. “There are many unknowns about how this would affect access and management. »

Hanscom said it’s more about creating a situation similar to the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. “[The NPS] would enhance the coastal experience here, not limit it,” she added.

She and Lieu emphasize that the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area is managed jointly with other state and local governments and that the federal government does not control it.

“This bill does not change ownership, management or authority over local or state lands,” Lieu said.

The public comment period on the proposal is open until April 6, 2026. Even then, the decision to designate these areas as a national park is far from finalized. If the study recommends Los Angeles Beach to the national park system, Congress would still have to vote on the designation.

Hanscom is skeptical that anything can be done under the current federal administration — she doubts Lieu and other House representatives would even introduce the bill to designate the area as a national park until the House has at least a majority. But there is no specific time frame for these actions to be implemented once a recommendation has been made.

If made into a national park, Hanscom hopes it will bring more tourist attention to this beautiful part of the Los Angeles cityscape, and more education about the unique ecosystems of its beaches and wetlands.

“We have a gem here that could be discovered further,” Hanscom said.

Learn more: 5 American National Parks with Fascinating Features

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