Santa Monica Pier

Attractions

Pacific Park

The pier contains Pacific Park, a family amusement park with its solar panelled Ferris wheel. The brightly lit wheel can be seen from a distance and has been turned off during the Earth Hour observance.

Other attractions

It also has an original carousel hippodrome from the 1920s, the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium operated by Heal the Bay, shops, entertainers, a video arcade, a trapeze school, pubs, and restaurants. The pier's west end is a popular location for anglers.

The carousel, housed within the Looff Hippodrome, features hand‑carved wooden horses and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The pier is a venue for outdoor concerts, movies, and other activities.

History

Santa Monica has had several piers; however, the current Santa Monica Pier is made up of two adjoining piers that long had separate owners. The long, narrow Municipal Pier opened September 9, 1909, primarily to carry sewer pipes beyond the breakers and had no amenities. The short, wide adjoining Pleasure Pier to the south, also known as Newcomb Pier, was built in 1916 by Charles I. D. Looff and his son Arthur, amusement park pioneers. Attractions on the Pleasure Pier eventually included the Santa Monica Looff Hippodrome building (which now houses the current carousel and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places), the Blue Streak Racer wooden roller coaster (which was purchased from the defunct Wonderland amusement park in San Diego), the Whip, merry-go-rounds, Wurlitzer organs, and a funhouse.

The Philadelphia Toboggan Company built the Carousel, PTC #62, in 1922. It features 44 hand-carved horses. It was rebuilt in 1990 inside the Hippodrome. A calliope provides musical accompaniment.

The La Monica Ballroom opened on July 23, 1924. Designed by T. S. Eslick with a Spanish façade and French Renaissance interior, it was the largest dance hall on the west coast, accommodating 5,000 dancers on its 15,000-square-foot (1,400 m2) hard maple floor. Country music star Spade Cooley began broadcasting his weekly television show from the ballroom in 1948, where the program remained until 1954. In the summer of 1955, the Hollywood Autocade opened at the La Monica with 100 famous and unusual cars, including Jack Benny's Maxwell and a Rumpler Drop Car. From 1955 to 1962, the ballroom served as a roller skating rink, first as Skater's Ballroom, and later as the Santa Monica Roller Rink, where the speed skating club won many state and regional championships and later Champion speed skater Ronnie Rains become a Roller Derby star. The rink's operator was Jack Goodrich, a former vaudeville and silent film star. The operator's daughter, Michelle Goodrich, later became a showgirl in the Ice Capades. The La Monica Ballroom was demolished in 1963 as a result of the Newcomb family waiting too long to start repairs.

The Pleasure Pier thrived during the 1920s but faded during the Great Depression. During the 1930s, most of the amusement park facilities were closed down and its attractions sold off. A breakwater was built in 1934 that provided docking for up to 100 fishing and pleasure boats near the pier.

Management

The City of Santa Monica created a non-profit in response to the damage and called it Santa Monica Pier Restoration Corporation (SMPRC). SMPRC is headquartered on Hippodrome's second floor, with former apartments being converted into offices, and conducted the daily operations of the Santa Monica Pier, such as managing events, filming, promotions, tenants, and street performers. SMPRC has produced the Santa Monica Pier Paddle Board Race and the Twilight Summer Concert Series. In 2011, SMPRC changed the company name to the Santa Monica Pier Corporation (SMPC).

In popular culture

Books

In the popular book series The Dark Artifices by Cassandra Clare, the fictional Los Angeles Institute overlooks the Santa Monica Pier. Most of the major plot is set in this vicinity.

My Life Above the Carousel in Santa Monica: This is a memoir by Elaine Jones Stephenson about her life living in an apartment above the carousel on the pier during the post-WWII era. It details her experiences with the pier's attractions, the surrounding community, and the activities of the time.

Songs

Kay Kyser's Campus Cowboys - "When Veronica Plays the Harmonica (On the Pier at Santa Monica)" (1946)

Noel Harrison - "Santa Monica Pier" (1968)

The Beach Boys - "Strange World" (2012)

Hayley Kiyoko - "Curious"

Films

The Santa Monica Pier lies within the studio zone; consequently, it has been used as a filming location for many decades. The amusement park attractions as they existed in 1930s are seen prominently in the Our Gang short Fish Hooky (1933). It also appears prominently in Tillie's Punctured Romance (1914), Quicksand (1950), Elmer Gantry (1960), 1941 (1979 film), The Opposite of Sex (1998), They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969), Night Tide (1961), Bean (1997), The Sting (1973), Farewell, My Lovely (1975) with Robert Mitchum, Her (2013), A Night at the Roxbury (1998), Mighty Joe Young (1998), Miracle Beach, Forrest Gump (there is a Bubba Gump Shrimp Company Restaurant on the pier), Not Another Teen Movie, Iron Man, Desperate Teenage Lovedolls, Dark Ride, Cellular, The Hottie and the Nottie, Falling Down, Ruthless People (the pier is the site of the movie's climactic final scene), Love Stinks, Hancock, The Happytime Murders, Sharknado, the indie romantic comedy She Wants Me, and Hannah Montana: The Movie (the scene with Lilly's birthday party). During the earthquake in the movie 2012, the pier can be seen sinking beneath the waves. The Natalie Wood film Inside Daisy Clover (1965) features the pier in the beginning of the picture. The pier was also featured in the 2012 film version of Rock of Ages. The Glenn Miller Story with Jimmy Stewart has a sequence toward the beginning where he goes to the La Monica Ballroom for an audition. The pier is also featured in the 2018 film Pacific Rim Uprising, starring John Boyega, where a kaiju attack destroys the pier (as well as the entire city). Jack Dawson in Titanic references the pier, which would have been just three years old in 1912, when the ship sank.

Television

The Girl from U.N.C.L.E., "The Mother Muffin Affair" (1966), though set in London, climax features action scene on the carousel, the arcade room, and several pier locations.

The Mod Squad, "Home Is in the Streets", Season 4, Episode 3 (1971).

The Rockford Files Season 1, episode 1. In the series' opening scene, a city bus pulls up alongside the pier in the adjacent parking lot.

Columbo, in "The Most Crucial Game", the private detective Dobbs goes to meet Columbo at a restaurant ("Ocean Side East Cafe") at the end of the pier on the lower deck.

Charlie's Angels episodes "The Sandcastle Murders" and "Angels in Waiting".

The Incredible Hulk episode "King of the Beach" was filmed there.

Three's Company, in the opening titles of the fourth and fifth seasons.

Star Trek: Voyager features an episode in which the pier is in the 20th century Los Angeles.

South Park episode "Fishsticks" ends with Kanye West jumping off the Santa Monica Pier to begin a new life as a gay fish.

The Tonight Show with Jay Leno commercial bumper

South of Nowhere, in the opening credits and in the episode "Girls Guide to Dating".

The Suite Life of Zack & Cody episodes "The Suite Life Goes to Hollywood Pts. 1/2".

Life After People episode "Waves of Devastation"

Video games

American Truck Simulator (updated in full detail in 2024 as part of the 1.53 Update)

Cars: Race-O-Rama

Rush

Midnight Club: Los Angeles

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland

Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (as the basis of a similar pier)

Grand Theft Auto V (as the basis of a similar pier)

LEGO City Undercover (in the district Paradise Sands)

Mario Kart Tour and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (as part of the racetrack "Los Angeles Laps")

Dead Island 2 (the pier is in a mission and also is a part of the map that players can visit anytime)

Counter-Strike 2 (recreated in "Dogtown", a community made map officially added May 8 2025)

Horizon Forbidden West (the ruins of the pier can be visited in the Burning Shores DLC)

Ready or Not (as the basis of a similar pier)