District 4 Supervisor Alan Wong announced on Friday that he plans to sign on to a 2026 ballot measure that would let San Franciscans decide on the future of the Great Highway for the second time in a year.
After weeks in office, Wong said he found “a majority of Sunset residents who support reopening the Great Highway to cars on weekdays,” making the announcement the same day he filed paperwork to run for the District 4 seat, which will face a special election in June next year.
Wong is “prepared” to be one of the four supervisors needed to sponsor the ballot measure, which would be introduced next year, if at all. The ballot measure would be a “compromise,” Wong said, to bring cars back on the road during the week and keep it car-free on the weekends.
It is unlikely to pass.
Sunset Dunes, the oceanfront park on the former highway, was created following the passage of Proposition K in November 2024. The measure passed easily by a 55-45 tilt, but nearly two-thirds of District 4 voters were against it.
This sparked the recall of District 4 supervisor Joel Engardio, who championed Prop. K. In September 2025, a nearly identical ratio of District 4 voters opted to recall Engardio.
Wong called supporters and opponents of Sunset Dunes and let them know his decision before his announcement. He said he spent three weeks meeting with Sunset residents “across the political spectrum.”
One key person did not receive a call.
Connie Chan, the District 1 supervisor who first floated the idea of the ballot measure to bring cars back, had not heard from Wong’s office about his support before the announcement, according to her office.
“Supervisor Chan still supports the compromise,” said Robyn Burke, Chan’s legislative aide. “But we were not made aware of what Supervisor Wong’s proposals were and haven’t been reached out to.”
The likely doomed measure will facilitate Chan’s hopes for higher office: Chan is running for Congress in 2026 to take Pelosi’s seat, and that race and the Great Highway initiative would be on the same ballot. If the measure were to bring out Westside Chinese voters to the booths, Chan’s campaign would benefit.
At the same time, the labor interests backing Chan are cool on a Great Highway measure, as they feel it will bring out voters who could likely be hostile to the CEO tax and other labor-backed revenue measures.
Lucas Lux, president of Friends of Sunset Dunes and an opponent of the measure, got the call on Friday morning that Wong plans to support the ballot initiative, Lux said.
Before Wong was appointed, he told Lux that he would host neighborhood forums to inform his decision. But then Wong “said on the phone that his office didn’t have capacity to organize an open process itself,” Lux said.
“We are deeply disappointed with Supervisor Wong,” Lux wrote in a statement. “We believed that he was serious when he said he wanted to help restore trust after a divisive few years in the Sunset. Instead, he’s doing the opposite: claiming he’d listen to constituents while actively turning his back on them.”
A town hall on the future of Sunset Dunes, organized by the pro-park nonprofit, was slated to take place on Jan. 7. Over 200 people have registered to attend, according to the Friends of Sunset Dunes.
The nonprofit said it will “do everything we can to protect the park we love.”
Wong had discussed the Great Highway in private meetings with people including Lux, Vin Budhai, one of the plaintiffs of a lawsuit that claims that its closure was unlawful and at a public meeting organized by the political group ConnectedSF.
Budhai, who called Wong the day before his appointment and met with him again two weeks ago, caught him up to speed on the Great Highway lawsuit, which is slated to have a hearing in early January.
“I commend him for listening to everyone,” Budhai said. “He met people from both sides. He did the right thing.”
San Franciscans just voted to keep Sunset Dunes car-free, and it’s deeply frustrating to see Supervisor Wong immediately push a new ballot measure to bring cars back and reopen the Great Highway on weekdays. This do-over politics ignores the citywide mandate, undermines trust in the democratic process, and threatens one of our safest, most vibrant coastal parks.
Thanks for nothing supervisor.
It took three ballot measures for the Central Freeway to finally come down.
I know it sounds cynical to say, “Let them lose a few more times to get it out of their system,” but maybe there is an ethic to this.
I don’t believe the GHW park will be reversed city wide, but if there are thousands of pissed off D4 voters, I would rather they channel that frustration into the electoral process, than elsewhere. Some times democracy takes time.
@Ralph Lane – The reason it took three votes for the Central Freeway was dishonest wording on the ballot measure wording. Once that got clarified, the vote was clear.
“safest, most vibrant coastal parks.”
Is this AI slop?
Destroying the city’s third-most popular park that we approved by 10 points and the Coastal Commission approved is not a “compromise.” Sunset Dunes gets nearly 4,000 visitors a day on an average weekday. Running cars through it would also require removal of the picnic tables, seating, public art, fitness equipment, skate park, and would spell the end of ecological restoration work on the dunes. To say nothing of being a boondoggle that would put the city on the hook for millions of dollars to install new traffic signals and truck sand off the pavement in a losing battle against Mother Nature.
Westsiders do, however, have a legitimate complaint: The conversion of the highway to a park was supposed to come with transit improvements to help make it possible to replace car trips. The 29 Sunset has seen modest service increases and both it and the 28 19th Avenue have gotten improvements to speed and reliability, but this is a fraction of what was contemplated in the 2021 District 4 Mobility Study (https://www.sfcta.org/projects/district-4-mobility-study#panel-reports-documents), intended to accompany changes to this space. Other proposals like service increases for the 28 and the 18 46th Avenue, extending the 18 to connect to Daly City BART, and an express bus between the Richmond and Sunset and popular destinations in northern San Mateo County have not been implemented.
Instead of attacking Sunset Dunes, which is here to stay, westside politicians like Chan and Wong should focus on delivering those and other transit improvements.
@scottf – Exactly this. The D4 and D1 Supervisors should be working on transit improvements, not this nonsense.
The only public transit improvements that could be done would be more frequency of service. Unfortunately, this will not entice a major ridership increase. The main problem is the length of the average trip from the west side to downtown, Soma or Mission Bay job centers. The surface busses and trains are painfully slow – way too inefficient to pull people out of their cars. Still have doubts? Just ask the legions of automobile drivers on the west side.
Sorry Bill, not buying your ‘analysis’ based on ‘pulled out your a*s.’ Ridership on Muni *always* goes up when bus lines increase frequency and reliability. If the major trunk lines that are the 29 and 28 ran as often as the 44 does (or even more frequently) and if SFMTA painted more red bus lanes then fewer parents would feel resigned to drive their kids to school and sports practice and other people would rely on buses more for getting to work and appointments. That would take cars off the road and keep traffic moving.
Glen, you and your acolytes can have all the theories and wishes you all want (and hey, the goals for public transit use are good); but then there is the way the world works, the reality on the ground on the west side. Whether we are talking homelessness response or how to increase public transit, San Francisco is plagued by those who completely ignore how the world is, while enacting policy solely based on how they want the world to be.
@Bill M – More frequent service on the east/west routes but the bigger gap is public transit overall for people going north/south.
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 Wow! Actually looking at two solutions that support a sustainable future!! What a concept 🤦🏻♂️ Alan Wong should listen to his constituents for positive solutions like this rather than negative solutions like lawsuits and money pits like shoveling sand off a beach.
I’m ok with this appearing on the ballot yet again only if there is an additional clause that it shall never appear on the ballot again for 99 years.
However, create a ballot, where the risdencent of the Richmond/Sunset, be only allowed to vote on the measure, since it impacts, their lives.
@tubdo55 – Ridiculous. And if that fails, how about a “yer not from aroun’ here, what high school did you go to?” ballot measure?
What you propose is not how voting works. I’ve been shelling out money for decades to pay to clean sand off a highway that closes it 18% of the time, so I get to vote.
I believe that Sunset Dunes promenade has shown the community its need to stay closed and to keep the park exactly as it is. Too much wasted tax dollars would be spent to undo, what 54% of San Francisco’s voters to do, just last year.
District 4 appointed Supervisor Wong would be guilty of acting against the will of all of San Francisco s voters (54%) and Mr Wong would be doing exactly what Joel was recalled for, that’s is making rash decisions without hearing both sides of the issue affecting the whole of District 4 and what the rest of our San Francisco community voted for last year. Sunset Dunes is for the locals like me, all of San Francisco residents who voted for the park and the tourists who spend their money in our Outer Sunset shops and restaurants.
I think the folks who are still unhappy about the park need to pull up their big persons pants and settle down to enjoy the wonderful gift of open space and safety for children to play, safe lanes for bike riders, and open space to the human and dog walkers who love the promenade.
I’m 76 and I bought a three wheel bike that has a basket on the front for my Teddy (BFF) to ride on from and thru the promenade to access businesses on the other end of the promenade. I love and support Sunset Dunes. The air even better as it now smells like the Ocean and fog rather than carbon emission smog.
These anti-park Trump lovers are at it again.
Be serious. There aren’t any Trump lovers here. You just don’t know any Trump lovers because you live in a progressive bubble.
A deeper, more disturbing thought is that you think only Trump lovers care about working people’s ability to drive to work.
@Trump Hater – There’s that mythical “progressive bubble” again. People in San Francisco generally have friends in family from all over the nation (that’s why people yammer “yer not from aroun’ here” and babble about “transplants”), which makes us less in a bubble. Also, 10% of the people in this town voted for the guy for some reason.
The anti-park people do like to scream “FAKE NEWS!” whenever data doesn’t support their claims, and they went #PostTruth in the campaign to recall Joel Engardio. If you don’t want to be called out as Trumpy, maybe rethink doing those things.
Park for the people! Car for the Fascist!
I still don’t understand why park advocates continue to invent facts, warp the truth and denigrate their opponents (who are guilty of what? Wanting to easily get to work, bring their kids to school, or to go grocery shopping?) I call BS about erosion (that is the issue for the road south of Sloat), sand removal costs (let’s see the numbers in month by month comparison study – plenty of removal going on for the park), or that there are no traffic issues – please inspect Chain of Lakes at rush hour). An honest argument that closing the road brings more widespread public benefit than keeping it only for automobiles would suffice. The amount of people who regularly enjoy the space makes the argument.
Here’s an idea.Only let the people who live in the RIchmond/Sunset vote on that measure.
I’m disgusted with the city’s never ending war on cars, but politicians don’t get to have a redo just because they didn’t get the result they wanted. It was a stupid initiative that shouldn’t have been voted on in the first place. But now that it has, we’re stuck with it.
This highway should never have been closed in the first place. San Francisco’s assault on cars needs to end. Forcing workers and families onto unpoliced and inefficient mass transit does not work.
You’re implying that the…29 muni is a hotbed of crime? When is the last time you rode the 29? The ridership is mostly Asian elders and SFSU students from what I observe.
I meant to say 28! Sorry
@dansle6 – Looking over the traffic stats, there is no “assault on cars,” but cars sure are assaulting human beings to the tune of 2-3 hospitalizations a day.