San Francisco Marathon weekend brings road closures, transit changes across city
The Embarcadero shuts down early, Fisherman's Wharf gets restricted, and the full and 1st half marathons are already sold out. Plan around detours, not through them.
Drivers, transit riders, waterfront residents, and small businesses along the route will feel San Francisco Marathon weekend first. The Embarcadero closes before dawn, Fisherman's Wharf gets vehicle restrictions, and the full marathon and 1st Half Marathon are already sold out. With the course cutting through the Marina, the Presidio, Golden Gate Park and the Mission, the safest plan is to treat much of the north side of the city as a detour zone from Saturday through Sunday.
What is sold out and what is still open
The race returns July 25-26, 2026, and July 26 marks the 49th anniversary of the event’s first running on Sunday, July 10, 1977. Organizers say the marathon began with an estimated 1,000 runners; this year’s full marathon is a USATF-certified Boston Marathon qualifier and an Abbott World Marathon Majors qualifier.
The two marquee events are already gone: the full marathon and the 1st Half Marathon are sold out, though wait lists are available. If you still want to participate, inventory remains for the 2nd Half Marathon, 10K, Saturday 5K, Sunday 5K, and Ultramarathon. The full marathon is 26.2 miles, starts Sunday, July 26, at 5:15 a.m. at Embarcadero at Market Street, and finishes at Embarcadero at Howard. The 1st Half Marathon starts the same morning at 6:30 a.m. from the same start line and finishes in the Presidio at Lincoln and Ralston.
The course moves through the Embarcadero, Fisherman’s Wharf, the Marina, Crissy Field, the Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park, Haight-Ashbury, the Mission District, Potrero Hill, and Dogpatch.
Where the city closes down
The biggest pressure points are the waterfront and the bridge approaches. The Embarcadero closes from 12:01 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on race day, and Fisherman’s Wharf has vehicle restrictions from 5:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. In the Marina District, streets including Bay Street, Laguna Street, and Marina Boulevard are closed from 5:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m., which will matter for anyone trying to reach the waterfront, park near the route, or make an early morning delivery.
The Presidio and Golden Gate Bridge corridor has its own tight window. There is no vehicle access to the bridge through the Presidio from 4:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m., and Lincoln Boulevard and Old Mason Street are included in that closure window. The bridge roadway itself stays open to vehicle traffic in both directions, but the east sidewalk opens at 9:00 a.m. to bikes and pedestrians, while the west sidewalk opens at 10:00 a.m. to bikes only.
Closure notices are posted locally, mailed to residents in impacted areas, and posted at major entrances to Golden Gate Park and major roadways one week before the race.
How to move around without getting trapped
If you need to cross the city, build in extra time and assume reroutes. The most vulnerable corridors are the Embarcadero, the Marina, the Wharf, and the Presidio approaches, where closures overlap with the hours people are most likely to be heading to work, making deliveries, or coming in for breakfast and tourism traffic. Muni service and other transit patterns can be affected whenever these streets are blocked, so riders should plan for delays around the course rather than trying to thread through it.
The practical move is to handle race-week errands before the peak closure windows and use Saturday as a buffer day if you can. Bib number confirmations begin July 20, and packet pickup happens at the Health & Fitness Expo at Fort Mason Festival Pavilion, 2 Marina Blvd., with Friday hours from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturday hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Race-day packet pickup will not be available, so anyone racing should get to Fort Mason ahead of Sunday.
- Expect the heaviest vehicle restrictions before 10 a.m. near the Wharf, Marina, Presidio, and bridge approaches.
- Reach packet pickup at Fort Mason Festival Pavilion, 2 Marina Blvd., during the Friday or Saturday expo hours.
- If you are driving, avoid assuming normal access along the Embarcadero until midafternoon on Sunday.
- If you are biking or walking near the bridge, remember the east sidewalk opens first, then the west side later.
A quick planning checklist:
Where to watch without fighting the whole route
The best viewing spots are also the places with the most obvious consequences for nearby traffic, so the trick is to watch early and leave early. The start line at Embarcadero and Market Street will be busiest around the 5:15 a.m. marathon start and the 6:30 a.m. 1st Half Marathon start, while the waterfront near the finish at Embarcadero and Howard will be active later in the morning and into the afternoon.
For a less congested vantage point, the route through Crissy Field and the Presidio offers strong views of runners heading toward and away from the bridge, while the Golden Gate Park stretch gives you a longer, more spread-out race atmosphere. Those areas also let spectators stay inside recognizable landmarks instead of trying to weave through closed side streets in the Marina or the Wharf. Anyone planning to watch near the bridge should use the sidewalk opening times as the anchor: east side at 9:00 a.m. for bikes and pedestrians, west side at 10:00 a.m. for bikes only.
Another Embarcadero race segment this year
In May, organizers announced that the Saturday 5K start and finish lines are moving to the Embarcadero for the first time, with help from the Port of San Francisco, Muni and SFMTA. That change puts another race segment on one of the city’s most sensitive corridors and adds to the waterfront traffic already concentrated around the main marathon start and finish.
The San Francisco Port estimated 15,000 participants for the 2025 marathon.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
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