Santa Monica Pier

The story of how Santa Monica became Route 66's western terminus is more complicated than the simple 'highway runs to the ocean' framing suggests. When Route 66 was commissioned in 1926, the original western terminus was at Seventh Street and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles — not at the ocean at all. The route was extended west to Santa Monica in 1936 to connect with the rapidly growing beach community, and the official endpoint was placed at Olympic Boulevard and Lincoln Boulevard, about a mile inland from the Pacific.

Generations of Route 66 travelers, however, ignored this technicality and continued the additional mile west until they reached the ocean. The pier was the natural finish line — the visible, tangible endpoint where the highway truly ran out of land. Photographs and home movies from the 1940s through 1970s consistently show road-trippers celebrating at the pier rather than at the inland street intersection, and the cultural mythology of Route 66 cemented Santa Monica Pier as the western terminus regardless of the technical highway-engineering reality.

When the official Route 66 designation was decommissioned in 1985, the highway no longer had any official terminus at all — it ceased to be a designated U.S. highway. But by then the cultural and tourism identity of the pier as the End of the Trail was so well established that the 2009 installation of the official sign at the pier was less a creation of new identity than a formal acknowledgment of what travelers had treated as the endpoint for decades.

The official 'Santa Monica 66 End of the Trail' sign was installed at the pier entrance in November 2009 in a ceremony organized by the Route 66 Alliance, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving and promoting Route 66 heritage. The sign was designed to visually echo the classic shield-and-script Route 66 highway markers but with the explicit 'End of the Trail' designation. The matching 'Begin' sign in Chicago's Grant Park had been installed years earlier, and the Santa Monica installation completed the symbolic bookends of the route.

The sign sits at the pier's eastern entrance, where the wooden boardwalk meets the parking lot and the bridge across Pacific Coast Highway. The location was chosen for visibility, photograph framing (the sign can be photographed with the pier extending into the ocean behind it), and ease of access for travelers. The sign has become the de facto endpoint photograph for nearly every Route 66 road-tripper — the visual equivalent of touching home base after a 2,448-mile drive.

Photographing the sign typically involves a brief wait. During peak Route 66 tourism months (April through October) there is usually a small line of road-trippers each waiting for an unobstructed photo. Most travelers are good-natured about the line and will photograph each other's groups in exchange. Early morning (before 9am) and late evening (after 8pm) are the quietest times. Sunset photographs with the sign in the foreground and the Pacific in the background are the consensus most-iconic frame.

Pacific Park is the small amusement park occupying the pier's central deck. The park operates twelve rides spanning the typical family-amusement-park range — the solar-powered Pacific Wheel (a nine-story Ferris wheel and the only solar-powered Ferris wheel in the world), the West Coaster (a steel roller coaster that runs the length of the pier), the Sea Dragon swinging ship, a small drop tower, bumper cars, and several smaller children's rides. Individual ride tickets run roughly $5 to $10; all-day unlimited wristbands run around $32 to $40 depending on the season.

The 1922 Looff Hippodrome carousel building at the pier's entrance houses a hand-carved carousel that is the carousel's third generation but contains animals from the early 20th century. The building itself is a National Historic Landmark — one of the few pier carousels in the United States with that designation. Rides are inexpensive (around $3 to $5) and the building's interior is worth a brief visit even for non-riders.

Beyond the formal rides, the pier hosts a substantial collection of carnival-style midway games, food vendors selling churros and corn dogs and lemonade, fortune tellers, and a working pier-end fishing area where local anglers fish for mackerel and bonito. The Santa Monica Pier Aquarium sits beneath the pier on the beach level and operates as a small marine education facility focused on local Pacific Ocean species.

Parking at the pier is the primary practical challenge. The official pier parking deck and surrounding city lots fill up by mid-morning on weekends and during the summer season. Rates run roughly $3 to $5 per hour with daily maximums around $20 to $30. Alternative parking options include the Santa Monica Place mall garage (a 10-minute walk east), the Santa Monica city lots (variable distance, often cheaper than pier-adjacent options), or street parking in residential neighborhoods further inland (free but limited and tightly metered).

Public transit is a genuinely viable alternative. The Metro E Line (formerly Expo Line) light rail terminates at the Downtown Santa Monica station, two blocks from the pier — the rail trip from downtown Los Angeles takes roughly 50 minutes and avoids all parking issues. Most major LA-area hotels can arrange a shared shuttle or rideshare for the pier visit at a fraction of the hassle of self-driving.

Santa Monica weather is famously mild year-round but has some quirks. Coastal fog ('June Gloom') can produce overcast mornings from late May through early July; the fog typically burns off by midday. Winter temperatures rarely drop below 50°F but the ocean breeze can make the pier feel substantially cooler than inland Los Angeles. Layered clothing is the standard recommendation. Sturdy walking shoes are appropriate — the pier surface is wooden boardwalk with occasional gaps.

The natural Santa Monica day plan combines the pier with the surrounding beach and shopping district for a full-day visit. The classic sequence: arrive at the pier by 10am, photograph the End of the Trail sign before the lines build, walk Pacific Park and the carousel (1-2 hours), have lunch at the Chez Jay dive bar a few blocks south on Ocean Avenue (the local Route 66 endpoint dining tradition), spend the afternoon on Santa Monica State Beach or shopping at the Third Street Promenade (10-minute walk inland), and return to the pier at sunset for the iconic golden-hour photographs.

For Route 66 road-trippers completing the full route, the pier visit is typically a half-day or full-day celebration after weeks on the road. Many travelers extend the celebration with a dinner at one of Santa Monica's more substantial restaurants (Shutters on the Beach's Coast restaurant, the Fairmont Miramar's FIG, or the historic Chez Jay) and an overnight stay at one of the beachfront luxury hotels (Shutters on the Beach, Hotel Casa del Mar, or the Fairmont Miramar Hotel) to mark the trip's completion.

Geographically, Santa Monica anchors the western end of the California Route 66 corridor. Pasadena sits about 25 miles east via Colorado Boulevard (the original 1926 Route 66 alignment through the San Gabriel Valley). San Bernardino sits about 60 miles east as the gateway to the Mojave Desert section. The full California Route 66 stretch is 315 miles from the Arizona border at Needles to the Santa Monica Pier — and the pier itself is the symbolic exclamation point at the very end.