Silver Beach County Park in St. Joseph had a busy summer, according to new numbers just released by the Berrien County Parks Department.

Environmental Property Manager Jaysen Field tells us for the summer of 2025, about 73,500 vehicles were counted entering the parking lot. While that’s down 4% from the previous year, Field says 2024 set the record for the most cars at the beach. Plus, he says there was some poor weather in May and June this year, explaining the slight drop in attendance.

Do they know how many people in total visited the beach, whether on foot or by vehicle?

“We extended to a full extra second lane for the entrance at Silver Beach,” Field said. “We have found that helped speed up the lines a bit, get people in as quick as possible. The city had their traffic management kind of layout. We worked in coordination with them to try to keep traffic moving as best as we could.”

This year featured from traffic changes for those entering the park. Field says they appeared to have helped.

“We’ve conducted studies on that. I think we, on average, have about 718,000 visitors come annually. Most of that’s going to be in the summertime. I think about 550,000 are people coming within the three months of peak summer.”

The Lifeguard Team of 19 made 130 first aid assists, reunited 64 lost or missing children with their loved ones, performed two water rescues or assists, and managed 19 days with high risk swim conditions.

Field says all in all, it was a good year at the beach.