St. Johns County Beach Services celebrates 2024 summer of success

ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. — In the wake of 2024’s peak beach season, St. Johns County Beach Services is celebrating a summer of successfully serving our visitors and residents amid major storms and extensive renovations.

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The following is a breakdown of the extensive work that had been done through the beach area:

Tolls

During the Summer 2024 season, Beach Services hired 41 new toll attendants, maintained a staff of 53 part-time employees, created new lead positions, and sold a total of approximately 78,000 beach passes.

Trash

Staff removed roughly 70 tons of trash from the beach, cleared six derelict boats, and removed washed-up items including a cargo ship fender, marine markers, buoys, and more.

Special Events

A total of 971 events were hosted along St. Johns County’s 42 miles of beach, mostly surf camps and weddings. There were 12 surf contests and five major impact events (each including over 200 people).

St. Johns County hosted state and national elected officials for a community forum addressing stormwater flooding in the North Beach area

Renovations

In early July, St. Johns County completed the $38.6 million Ponte Vedra Restoration Project two months ahead of schedule. Vilano Beach Oceanfront Park (2752 Anahma Drive, St. Augustine) reopened on July 17 after a $1.8 million renovation.

Sea Turtle Conservation

Staff spent over 141 hours responding to 80 reports of stranded sea turtles, and nine part-time members of night staff raked approximately 145 sea turtle nests (raking each nest for 10 to 25 days), removing ruts adjacent to nests due to hatch.

Other Highlights

Beaches staff successfully broke down and reinstalled infrastructure before and after Hurricanes Helene and Milton brought impacts to Northeast Florida. Throughout the season, Beach Services continued maintaining the dunes critical to the beach ecosystem.

Fourteen beach walkovers were upgraded, and a new Mobi-mat was installed for greater accessibility at Vilano Beach. New positions were created for workers to operate the grader machine used for the daily grading of beach access ramps. Vilano Beach vehicular access and South Ponte Vedra Beach 4x4-permitted driving access were both reopened.

Beach Services added the environmental technician position to assist and expand the Habitat Conservation team, crucial to such efforts as our work during the sea turtle nesting season. After last season’s huge success, we anticipate promising numbers once St. Johns County’s official data is calculated in early 2025.

The old Reach the Beach app is set to be retired on Dec. 2, with all beach info and updates now accessible via the SJC Connect app.

All the season’s work was done in the wake of an updated beach ordinance being adopted by the St. Johns County Board of County Commissioners, designed to better protect beachgoers and ensure the community enjoys the full benefits of our gorgeous beaches.

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