MANHATTAN BEACH, Calif. — On Tuesday, El Porto Beach became just a bit more accessible for all residents as Los Angeles County installed new semi-permanent access mats that stretch toward the ocean.

When the county installs nylon-mesh mats like this, which Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn was on-hand to christen, it fulfills a mission to make the county's beaches more easily accessible for all people.

What You Need To Know

  • Los Angeles County has installed semi-permanent access mats toward the water line at El Porto Beach, in north Manhattan Beach

  • The nylon mesh mats make it easier to traverse toward the water for people with mobility issues, or anyone trying to wheel or walk down to the waterline

  • The mats at El Porto extend from the existing "Pathway to the Sea," which was built following the advocacy of a longtime Manhattan Beach resident

  • Similar access mats have been installed by Los Angeles County in Torrance, Malibu, and Pacific Palisades

Hahn knows El Porto well. When she was just a girl, her family would drive to El Porto — a small community now part of Manhattan Beach — each week during the summer.

"Certainly for people in wheelchairs, in walkers, parents pushing strollers, dragging their coolers, this makes it even more accessible," Hahn said. "And that's what I learned growing up, in South Central Los Angeles, is that the beach was for everybody. We're striving in L.A. County to make our beaches more accessible because beaches belong to the public.

These mats were installed at the end of what the community calls the "Pathway to the Sea," a 70-foot-long concrete path from Manhattan Beach resident Evelyn Frey's beach access advocacy.

From the mid-2000s and beyond, Frey pushed the city of Manhattan Beach, Los Angeles County, and anyone who would listen to install a roll-out beach access mat near the Manhattan Beach Pier. Her goal was to give people with mobility difficulties like her a chance to be nearer to the water. In 2014, when Frey was 98 years old, the pathway was completed, bringing her closer to the beach than she had been in years.

"Here I am, down at the sand for the first time in seven years!" she told The Beach Reporter newspaper in 2014.

The new mats are an extension of her path, stretching another 60 feet closer to the waterline before intersecting with a 110-foot-long mat that runs north and south, parallel to the ocean.

This is the latest in a series of ongoing access mat installations at L.A. County beaches. Last year, L.A. County's Department of Beaches and Harbors installed a similar access mat at Torrance Beach; other access mats have been installed at Zuma Beach and Topanga Beach in Malibu and Will Rogers Beach in Pacific Palisades.

This mat was driven, in part, by further community demand, said Manhattan Beach City Council Member Hildy Stern.

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"In the two short years that I've been on City Council, we've continued to get requests for better access to the beach by a whole spectrum of different members of our community, ranging from older adults who want to be able to access the beach to parents with children with limitations that they can't walk across the sandy beach," Stern said. She took those concerns to Hahn, and the county responded.

"It's a beautiful day every time you come to the beach, and knowing that it's going to be accessible to everybody…it feels like we've done something that's been done for the right reasons," Stern said.