State Begins Charging For Trestles Parking

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• September 08 2009
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Photo: FRED SWEGLES, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Heading to Trestles? Be prepared to pay $15 for parking as California seeks avenues to battle its budget crisis. Beginning August 19, the state implemented a $15 fee to park at the popular break in the lot next to Carl’s Jr. that had previously been free.

According to the Union-Tribune:

In the full swing of the state’s budget crisis, and desperately seeking any source of revenue, the state park, which owns the land at Trestles and the parking lot, turned its eye to the resource at Lowers.

Some surfers are being optimistic that — even though $15 seems an exorbitant toll for a surf session — things might have been worse. After all, it was only in December that a years-long battle to defeat the proposed extension of the 241 Toll Road, which would have run adjacent to Trestles, came to an end.

In addition, some surfers feared that Trestles, which has limitations on the number of contests that can be held on its beaches each year, would begin holding regular contests at the break as a means of generating revenue for the state. This would have limited access to regular Trestles surfers.

Many surfers, while outraged at the prospect of paying a high fee to park where they previously parked for free, are hopeful that the steep price of admission will thin out the notoriously overpacked crowds at Trestles.

Besides, given the state’s $14.2 million budget deficit, pay parking might be a new reality at breaks throughout California.