Last Christmas, volunteers knocked on the door of a South Bay home, arms laden with gifts.
The door opened to a woman who burst into tears. She’d forgotten her children were receiving Christmas gifts from Pedal Beach Tours that year. She had been too busy caring for her husband, who had brain cancer.
“She was beside herself and so grateful for Pedal Beach’s help in making her children’s Christmas happen,” volunteer Meryl Loeb told the Coronado City Council at its April 21 meeting.
That is one of many stories of Pedal Beach Tours, and the reason its founders are fighting to get back on the road.
Pedal Beach Tours is a Coronado charity that offers pedicab tours of the island and says it has been shut down since January after the city declined to renew its operating permit — caught, its founders say, in rules designed to crack down on reckless e-bike riders, not slow-moving sightseeing tours run by conscientious professionals.
Every dollar collected from Pedal Beach’s tours, including tips, funds Christmas gifts and holiday meals for underserved children in the South Bay. Last Christmas, the nonprofit delivered gifts to 67 kids and provided a complete holiday meal for 25 families.
But Pedal Beach Tours says it can no longer get a permit to operate its single pedicab on two key stretches thanks to the city’s new restriction on motorized mobility devices on certain pathways. Those two stretches, the organization says, are key to the major landmarks Pedal Beach tours showcase: the beachfront path in front of the Hotel del Coronado and the promenade between the Bluewater Boathouse Seafood Grill and the recreation center.
“Pedal Beach Tours has been caught in the net to corral those e-bikes that are a real danger,” volunteer guide Cyril Light, a physician, told the City Council, adding that he understands the challenge of reckless e-bikes and the need to protect pedestrian safety. “That is not what Pedal Beach is about.”
The Pedal Beach pedicab is a pedal-assisted three-wheeler, so it falls into the broader category of “motorized mobility devices,” which the city restricts in certain areas (mobility aids for disabilities are excepted). When the city enacted the new rules in January 2025, much of the discourse centered on e-bikes and safety concerns related to speed and sidewalk use. Supporters of Pedal Beach say that the pedicab operates at low speeds and in a controlled manner, and should be considered differently under the rules.
“I have guided 86-year-old guests who are wheelchair bound, along with mothers nursing their children, as well as guests who are disabled,” Light said. “You won’t see me doing any wheelies on my pedicab.”
Founder Jeffrey Davis, a former Coronado High School principal, brought the permit issues to the council alongside several volunteer guides asking for two specific exemptions: permission to operate on the previously approved routes, and reinstatement of an A-frame advertising sign on Orange Avenue in front of the Bank of California, a sponsor of Pedal Beach.
Davis said the sign was confiscated after the city determined that Pedal Beach didn’t have a business on Orange Avenue. That sign, Davis said, generated nearly half of the nonprofit’s bookings.
“For more than a year, we’ve been unable to renew our permit with the city of Coronado,” Davis told the council. “Despite numerous attempts to do so, Pedal Beach Tours and Charities is now shut down.”
Because Davis and his supporters spoke during public comment, council members, by rule, could not comment on the matter during the meeting. However, Davis requested that the matter be placed on a future agenda for discussion. At the time of publication, the city of Coronado had not yet responded to a request for comment.
Still, the situation has drawn frustration from the volunteers who give their time — and in some cases, travel considerable distances — to run the tours. Light, the physician who spoke in support of Pedal Beach, said he drives three hours from the Los Angeles area to lead the tours.
But for now, the Pedal Beach pedicab isn’t going anywhere.
“We need your help to correct this unintended consequence,” Davis said.
