For six years, the fight over the Great Highway has been about traffic, safety, and who gets a say in the Sunset. With four weeks to go before the election, the campaign to keep Sunset Dunes car-free has landed on a simpler pitch: happy kids.
Last month, the park got its first playground. Shipwreck Cove, a ship-shaped play structure that sits a few feet from Ocean Beach, was built with $800,000 in private donations raised by Friends of Sunset Dunes, the group that backed the 2024 measure that created the park. The structure opened as a one-year pilot that can be extended. Within days, it was full of children.
It quickly became campaign fodder. The campaign against Proposition G, a ballot measure that would reopen the road to cars on weekdays, is running two ads on Facebook and Instagram: one about the cost of reopening the road, the other about losing the park benches and playground. Both leaned into the emotive issue of children. As a soothing voice makes the campaign’s case, video of the park in action shows a boy climbing down from the new playground. Another ad provided by the campaign shows children (opens in new tab) gathered on top of it, saying “we love Sunset Dunes.”
In light of the kids monkeying around on the playground smack in the middle of Sunset Dunes, it isn’t hard to find parents who plan to vote against Prop. G.
The No on G campaign is telling voters that voting “yes” on the ballot measure means voting “no” on the park. | Source: Manuel Orbegozo for The Standard
Most have seen signs supporting or opposing the measure in neighborhood windows or the ads in opposition. Yet when they’re asked to recall what they remember from the videos they all say they remember the same thing.
“I remember a kid being happy,” said Emily Novia, whose son is 4.
“Videos of the park, the kids,” said Rolando Contreras, 35, watching his 21-month-old son Teo toddle up a play structure’s steps.
The debate about whether to reopen the Great Highway to cars has revolved around concerns about displaced traffic clogging nearby residential streets and making them unsafe. Those supporting the park have attempted to dispute those claims with their own crash metrics. But the ads convey a more emotional message: Voting “yes” on G means voting “no” on kids.
Sunset Dunes opened in April 2025, five months after voters approved Proposition K, which permanently closed a two-mile stretch of the Upper Great Highway. The highway had been car-free on weekends since 2022, after a pandemic-era full closure. Prop. G, which qualified for the November ballot by signature petition in July, would reopen the road to cars each week from 4 a.m. Monday until 6 p.m. Friday.
Kids playing on the Shipwreck Cove playground is shown in No on G ads. | Source: Tâm Vũ for The Standard
Sunset Dunes, along with its playground, are popular among young families. | Source: Tâm Vũ for The Standard
The city controller estimates that reopening would cost about $9.8 million upfront, mostly for new traffic signals, plus $500,000 to $1.9 million a year.
The ads highlight the gulf in campaign cash between the two sides. The “yes” campaign has received $101,000 (opens in new tab) in contributions and has spent $59,000, according to the city’s Ethics Commission. Add a zero to both those numbers, and you’d still be short (opens in new tab) of what the “no” campaign has raised and spent. The “no” campaign has spent $183,000 on literature and mailers and $60,000 on TV ads, according to Ethics Commission filings, while the “yes” campaign has spent $4,300, all on radio ads.
Framing a political issue as a matter of children’s welfare can be effective. Campaigns need voters’ attention and trust, and children command both, according to political strategist Jim Ross.
“They are using one of the most powerful spokespeople you can have, which is kids,” Ross said.
No on G campaign manager Lucas Lux claimed the campaign isn’t focusing on kids and is telling all park users that voting “yes” would close it. He also disputes the Yes on G campaign’s claim that the Great Highway can be both a park and a road, since reopening it to traffic would require removing seating and the playground.
“What we had before was a road closure,” he said. “That’s not a park.”
Shipwreck Cove, a playground in the middle of Sunset Dunes, opened last month. | Source: Tâm Vũ for The Standard
Ryuka, 5, said he’d prefer to keep the park — and the playground — over a road during weekdays.
“Playground,” he said softly, avoiding meeting this reporter’s gaze. “I like the ship.”
Asked what would improve the park, which sits feet from Ocean Beach, he was decisive.
“More sand,” he said, burying his hands in the stuff.
Ads separate from the “no” campaign but featured on its Instagram page (opens in new tab) argue that car crashes in District 4 have declined since the Great Highway closed and that Sunset Dunes is the city’s third-most-popular park.
Ryuka’s mom, Denise Leo, 50, supports Prop. G because it would restore the road for weekend commutes. She drives Friday mornings for work as a library aide in San Mateo and wants the option of taking the Great Highway, rather than 19th Avenue. The pathway above the highway always worked when she wanted to go for a run, anyway. Or, wait, does she oppose G?
Told that a “no” vote keeps the road closed to cars, she paused. In 2024, she pointed out, it was the “no” vote that kept the highway open.
“I’m gonna vote to open it,” she said, looking at her son. “Even though he likes it.”