Will Rogers State Beach | |
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Location | Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California |
Coordinates | 34°2′23″N118°33′37″W / 34.03972°N 118.56028°W |
Governing body | California Department of Parks and Recreation |
www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=625 |
Will Rogers State Beach is a beach park on the Santa Monica Bay, at the Pacific coast of Southern California. Located in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, the beach is owned by the California Department of Parks and Recreation; however, it is managed and maintained by the Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors. A section just south of the intersection of Pacific Coast Highway and Entrada Drive ( 34°01′34″N118°31′08″W / 34.026053°N 118.518824°W ) is popular within the LGBT community [1] and is therefore considered Los Angeles' unofficial gay beach; [2] this section is often referred to as Ginger Rogers Beach. [3]
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The beach extends one and three quarters miles along the coast. It has many facilities, including volleyball courts, gymnastic equipment, restrooms, a playground, and a bike path. The bike path is part of the South Bay Bicycle Trail and extends 19.1 miles (30.7 km) along the shore to Torrance, California. [4] The beach is also a popular surf spot.
Many films and television shows have been filmed at the beach, including Creature from the Black Lagoon , The Kiss , La Belle dame sans merci , Summer Children , Holidays with Heather , and Hangman . [5] Also, the television show Baywatch was shot at the beach before it moved to Hawaii. [6] [7]
In the sea near Will Rogers State Beach at Sunset Blvd., there is the grounding electrode of the Pacific DC Intertie. [8]
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The beach is named after actor, commentator and humorist Will Rogers, and partly originated with his property. In the 1920s, Rogers bought the land and developed a ranch along the coast and upland past today's Sunset Boulevard. He owned 345 acres (140 ha) in all, in what is now Pacific Palisades, beginning with about 1300 feet along the beach. Rogers died in a plane crash in 1935. Before his widow Betty's death in 1944, she developed a plan to gift their oceanfront to the state as the core of the original Will Rogers State Beach, which then ran 6300 feet of coastline in total. The beach was dedicated on July 26, 1942, with California Governor Culbert Olson and Los Angeles Mayor Fletcher Bowron on hand.
The state beach should not be confused with the nearby Will Rogers State Historic Park north of Sunset Boulevard, formed from a similar gift by Betty Rogers of 186 acres of the original contiguous Rogers ranch deeded on June 8, 1944, two weeks before her death. [9]
State Route 1 (SR 1) is a major north–south state highway that runs along most of the Pacific coastline of the U.S. state of California. At 656 miles (1,056 km), it is the longest state route in California, and the second-longest in the US after Montana Highway 200. SR 1 has several portions designated as either Pacific Coast Highway (PCH), Cabrillo Highway, Shoreline Highway, or Coast Highway. Its southern terminus is at Interstate 5 (I-5) near Dana Point in Orange County and its northern terminus is at U.S. Route 101 (US 101) near Leggett in Mendocino County. SR 1 also at times runs concurrently with US 101, most notably through a 54-mile (87 km) stretch in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, and across the Golden Gate Bridge.
Manhattan Beach is a city in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, United States, on the Pacific coast south of El Segundo, west of Hawthorne and Redondo Beach, and north of Hermosa Beach. As of the 2020 census, the population was 35,506.
Sunset Boulevard is a boulevard in the central and western part of Los Angeles, California, United States, that stretches from the Pacific Coast Highway in Pacific Palisades east to Figueroa Street in Downtown Los Angeles. It is a major thoroughfare in the cities of Beverly Hills and West Hollywood, as well as several districts in Los Angeles.
Pacific Palisades is a neighborhood in the Westside region of Los Angeles, California, situated about 20 miles (32 km) west of Downtown Los Angeles.
Gower Gulch is a nickname for the intersection of Sunset Boulevard and Gower Street in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California.
Will Rogers State Historic Park is the former estate of American humorist Will Rogers. It lies in the Santa Monica Mountains in Los Angeles, in the Pacific Palisades area.
The history of Santa Monica, California, covers the significant events and movements in Santa Monica's past.
Crystal Cove State Park is a state park of California, United States, encompassing 3.2 miles (5.1 km) of Pacific coastline, inland chaparral canyons, and the Crystal Cove Historic District of beach houses. The park is located partially in Newport Beach and partially in an unincorporated area of Orange County, and is part of the larger South Coast Wilderness area. Crystal Cove is a stretch of coastal cliffs and a beachfront cove situated between the Pacific Coast Highway and the Pacific Ocean, southeast of Newport Beach and northwest of Laguna Beach. The 3,936-acre (1,593 ha) park was established in 1979. The entire park hosts a total of 3 miles of beaches and tide pools, a 1,400 acre marine Conservation Area as well as underwater park, 400 acres of bluffs, and 2,400 acres of canyons.
The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area is a United States national recreation area containing many individual parks and open space preserves, located primarily in the Santa Monica Mountains of Southern California. The SMMNRA is in the greater Los Angeles region, with two thirds of the parklands in northwest Los Angeles County, and the remaining third, including a Simi Hills extension, in southeastern Ventura County.
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The Marvin Braude Bike Trail is a 22-mile (35 km) paved bicycle path that runs mostly along the shoreline of Santa Monica Bay in Los Angeles County, California. The coastal bike trail is widely acknowledged as Los Angeles’ “most popular bike path.”
Mandeville Canyon is a small community in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles. Its center is Mandeville Canyon Road, which begins at Sunset Boulevard and extends north towards Mulholland Drive, though it stops short of Mulholland and there is no automotive route between the two. Mandeville Canyon Road is said to be the longest paved, dead end road in Los Angeles, at over 5 miles (8.0 km) and as a result is a popular destination for road cycling. From start to finish, the road gains 1,000 ft (300 m) in elevation.
Hollywood Reservoir is a reservoir located in the Hollywood Hills, situated in the Santa Monica Mountains and north of the Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It is maintained by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. The reservoir and surrounding neighborhood lie east of the Hollywood Freeway and are overlooked, from a distance, by the Hollywood Sign.
The Backbone Trail is a long-distance trail extending 67.79 miles (109.10 km) across the length of the Santa Monica Mountains in the U.S. state of California. Its western terminus is Point Mugu State Park, and its eastern terminus is Will Rogers State Historic Park in Pacific Palisades. The trail is open to hikers throughout its length. Dogs, mountain bicyclists and horseback riders are only allowed on portions of the trail as posted.
Santa Monica State Beach is a California State Park operated by the city of Santa Monica.
There are 9 routes assigned to the "N" zone of the California Route Marker Program, which designates county routes in California. The "N" zone includes county highways lying in Los Angeles and Orange counties.
The Los Angeles Pacific Railroad (1896−1911) (LAP) was an electric public transit and freight railway system in Los Angeles County, California. At its peak it had 230 miles (370 km) of track extending from Downtown Los Angeles to the Westside, Santa Monica, and the South Bay towns along Santa Monica Bay.
The Long Wharf in Santa Monica, also known as Port Los Angeles or the Mile Long Pier, was an extensive pier wharf constructed by the Southern Pacific Railroad Company in Santa Monica Bay from 1892–94. When it opened in 1894, it was the longest wharf in the world, measuring approximately 4,700 feet (1,400 m). It served as a cargo and passenger port until 1913, and in 1919 removal of the wharf started. The wharf, the 1,000 foot (300 m) tip of the pier, was removed by 1920. The remaining 3,600 feet (1,100 m) of pier was used as a run down fishing pier until 1933, when the remainder of the pier was removed. One of the major imports to the wharf was lumber from Northern ports, to help in the construction boom in Southern California. Southern Pacific Railroad and the street cars of the Los Angeles Pacific Railroad served the wharf. Los Angeles Pacific Railroad ran passenger trams to the wharf and from midnight to sunrise ran cargo cars.