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Hollywood Beach Broadwalk: 10 reasons to take a trip to Old Florida on scenic paved path for walking or biking

As ever more highrises fill the skyline in Broward County, it seems a miracle that the low-rise, Old Florida, mom-and-pop Hollywood Beach Broadwalk remains.

So far, the 2.5-mile pedestrian and bike path along the ocean hasn’t been ruined by development, even though the Jimmy Buffet Margaritaville Resort was built in the middle of it a few years ago. At the time, many said it would ruin the ambiance they’d grown to love. In my visits, the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk is as charming as ever.

Vintage architecture gives the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk a little bit of Old Florida feel. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)
Vintage architecture gives the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk an Old Florida feel. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)

I love the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk — and yes, it is the Hollywood Broadwalk, not the Hollywood Boardwalk — for 10 big and little reasons:

1. In an urban area where it is downright dangerous to bike on many streets, the Broadwalk is a safe traffic-free bike path with spectacular ocean views and breezes. See more below on bicycling the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk.

2. There are still many surviving low- and mid-rise hotels and apartments built during the late 1920s and 1930s in the Streamline/Art Moderne, Mediterranean Revival, and Mid-Century Modern architectural styles.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk lifeguard stands are a perfect complement to the vintage architecture. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)
Hollywood Beach Broadwalk lifeguard stands are a perfect complement to the vintage architecture. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)

3. The vintage architecture might remind you a little of the Art Deco hotels of Miami Beach’s South Beach, but there is absolutely nothing hip about the Hollywood Beach Boardwalk. It has a small-town feel, where for years middle-aged French Canadians, rather than hipsters, have dominated the scene.

4. I admit I love the extraordinarily expensive lifeguard towers. Controversial because the little blue-and-yellow wooden structures cost $74,415 apiece, I think they are a perfect complement to the Broadwalk.

5. You won’t find this many open-air beachfront bars and restaurants that are casual and moderately priced anywhere else in South Florida. There are also multiple places to get an ice cream cone.

Bicyclists along the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk pass the Jimmy Buffett Margaritaville Resort, with its vintage RV, which sells snacks, beverages and sandwiches. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)
Bicyclists along the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk pass the Jimmy Buffett Margaritaville Resort, with its vintage RV, which sells snacks, beverages and sandwiches. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)

6. This may sound strange, but here’s another thing that’s great about the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk: Public bathrooms. There are a number of bathroom facilities along the Hollywood Broadwalk, an amenity it is often hard to find in Florida beach areas.

hollywood beach broadwalk charnow park fountain Hollywood Beach Broadwalk: 10 reasons to take a trip to Old Florida on scenic paved path for walking or biking
In the middle of the Hollywood Broadwalk is Charnow Park, a pocket park overlooking the ocean and adjacent to a parking garage. It has an interactive fountain that is a kid magnet. (Photo by Bonnie Gross)

7. Charnow Park, in the middle of the Broadwalk, at 300 Connecticut St., is conveniently adjacent to a large parking garage. It has shaded seating areas, a few covered pavilions with picnic tables, rest rooms and the star, if you’re with kids, a fountain you can run through and play in.

8. As you continue north on the paved pathway, you pass through shady Hollywood North Beach Park. The county park has lots of parking ($10 all day; which may be cheaper than hour-by-hour meter parking if you’re spending the day.) Here picnic tables are nestled under the seagrape trees near bathrooms and with easy access to a section of the beach where we found lots of seashells.

9. The nostalgic and historic bandshell on the Broadwalk, called the the Hollywood Beach Theatre, features live music from 7 to 9 p.m. five nights a week, Wednesday to Sunday. Programming is provided by the Margaritaville Hollywood Beach Resort, which is right across the Broadwalk from the stage. Margaritaville contracts with 30 local bands and musicians to program this and other stages at the resort, and musical styles vary. The bandshell, by the way, was built in 1924 by Hollywood founder Joseph Young.

hollywood beach broadwalk IMG 9536 Hollywood Beach Broadwalk: 10 reasons to take a trip to Old Florida on scenic paved path for walking or biking
Hollywood Broadwalk: The NSU Marine Environmental Education Center, where admission is free, has several exhibits that will interest both kids and adults. (Photo: Erin Blasco)

10. Two blocks north of North Beach Park on Surf Road is one of Broward County’s top freebies, where you can see captive sea turtles and other marine life– the Marine Environmental Education Center at the Carpenter House, operated by Nova Southeastern University. MEEC is located in a refurbished 1940s beachfront home. Inside, there are exhibits including aquariums with fish and turtles, sea turtle skulls and an excellent display of seashells.

Outside, a swimming pool is the permanent home to two green turtle. Members of an endangered species, these injured turtles cannot be released into the wild. Every day at 3:30 p.m., the turtles are fed lettuce grown on the grounds while a staff members gives a short talk and answers questions.

hollywood beach broadwalk sea turtle feeding Hollywood Beach Broadwalk: 10 reasons to take a trip to Old Florida on scenic paved path for walking or biking
Hollywood Broadwalk: If you keep walking north, you come to the NSU Marine Environmental Education Center, where two resident sea turtles are fed daily at 3:30 p.m. (Photo: Erin Blasco)

Biking Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

When we bring our bikes, we like to park at the Anne Kolb Nature Center in West Lake Park, 751 Sheridan St., Hollywood. Parking there is free, as opposed to beachfront parking meters where it’s easy to drop $12 for a few hours of biking.

From West Lake Park, it’s a five-minute ride east on Sheridan. (Don’t take the bike path; it goes under the Intracoastal bridge and then heads west on Sheridan again.) Crossing A1A, you’re at North Beach Park, a good place to start your Hollywood Broadwalk ride.

Surreys are popular bike rentals for families at Hollywood Beach Broadwalk. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)
Surreys are popular bike rentals for families at Hollywood Beach Broadwalk. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)

As you ride south on the Broadwalk, you’ll pass bars with live bands on weekends playing reggae or classic rock oldies. There is always a breeze, but if you get hot, stop and take a swim.  At the south end, the Broadwalk gives way to an alley-like Surf Road that continues through 1960s vintage low-rise hotels that evoke an earlier era.

Families love to stop at Charnow Park (at Connecticut Street) where there is shaded seating and an interactive fountain usually teeming with delighted children.

Don’t expect to ride fast here — too many kids on training wheels, four-wheel “bike buggies” and clueless pedestrians wandering into the marked bike lane. If you’re not patient and willing to take it slow, walk your bike through the busiest section at the middle.

At the north end of the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk, the trail goes through a shady tree-lined area. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)
At the north end of the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk, the trail goes through a shady tree-lined area. (Photo: Bonnie Gross)

On the north end of the Hollywood Broadwalk, you can continue as the urban setting gives way to a seagrape-lined route through North Beach Park and then onto a narrow Surf Road through a  funky residential area. This is my favorite part of the ride; it’s much less crowded and has more trees and foliage. You can continue all the way to the Dania Beach fishing pier. This is the section where you’ll find that free Marine Environmental Education Center.

If you don’t pause, the bike ride will take about 90 minutes. If you stop for a drink or meal, as we did, you could spend considerably longer.

We love to start this bike ride early before the Broadwalk gets too busy and have breakfast overlooking the ocean.

Hollywood Beach Broadwalk bike rentals

If you don’t bring your own bike, you can rent bikes and surreys at two locations on the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk:

Sun and Fun Cycles, which is located where Hayes Street meets the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk. This business offers a variety of bikes, including adult tricycles, low riders and recumbent models. They also carry wheelchairs and motorized scooters.

The Hollywood Beach Bike Shack, at 101 N. Ocean Drive also rents bikes, trikes, surreys and more.

Are electric bikes allowed on the Hollywood Broadwalk? No. But Segways and motorized wheelchairs or mobility scooters are allowed.

Are roller blades allowed on the Hollywood Broadwalk? Yes. While Hollywood considered banning roller blades in 2022, in the end it did not. Hollywood did ban “banana bikes,” which can do hairpin turns, something city leaders said was dangerous on the much-used Broadwalk.

Map of Hollywood Broadwalk, showing key hotels, parking and trolley stops.
Map of Hollywood Broadwalk, showing key hotels, restrooms, parking and trolley stops.

Hotels on the Hollywood Beach Broadwalk

The most prominent lodging on the Broadwalk is Margaritaville Beach Resort, 1111 N. Ocean Drive, where rates start around $250 a night off-season.

In that same price range is the Hollywood Beach Marriott, 2501 N Ocean Drive, at the northern end and, at the southern end of the Broadwalk, the Hilton-operated Diplomat Beach Resort, 3555 S Ocean Drive.

There are also nearly 100 smaller older hotels including some mom-and-pop place whose nightly rates begin as low as $80 off season.

How Hollywood Beach Broadwalk got its start

The Broadwalk began with a vision by Hollywood founder Joseph Young, whose development company carved it out of the sand and paved it in 1922. Two years later, he built the now long-gone Hollywood Beach Casino on the Broadwalk. It was a huge facility — 824 dressing rooms, 80 showers, a shopping arcade, and an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

Two years later, however, a disastrous hurricane marked the end of the boom, with property values plummeting and the city going bankrupt. The population of Hollywood dropped from 18,000 to 2,500.

Over the years, however, the Broadwalk retained its appeal. In 2007, it was ready for an upgrade and Hollywood added many of the features we appreciate today — bathrooms, palm trees, the distinctive coquina stone retaining wall, historic street lighting, and “lanes” for walking, jogging, and biking.

Things to do near Hollywood Beach Broadwalk




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Dave

Thursday 20th of January 2022

Bonnie, thanks for a great article! I'm visiting Hollywood Beach next month. Do you recall what type of bike-parking rules were being enforced for North Beach Park and Dania Beach? I'm curious because I didn't see bike racks at North Beach Park's parking lots when I checked Google street images online. Just telephone poles, light posts and sign posts. But I also didn't see warnings about not parking bikes. I don't want to lock my bike chain around a telephone pole, light post or other pole in the grass if the city/parks don't allow it! Any advice? Any feedback you may have would be appreciated. Thank you!

Bonnie Gross

Thursday 20th of January 2022

Dave, there are bike racks in various locations along Hollywood Beach Broadwalk. (I also used Google streetview to "ride" down the Broadwalk and saw a couple of bike racks -- at 3200 N. Broadwalk, at 1098 N. Broadwalk, for example.) There are a lot of bikes here and I have never seen any enforcement involving parked bikes. I don't think you'll have a problem finding a place to lock up. Good luck!

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