Beaches, Parks & Trails

Beaches

Nantucket has some of the most beautiful and pristine beaches in the world with a variety of surf conditions and amenities. Find map and detailed information on the island’s beaches.

Jetties Beach has an accessible restaurant and restrooms and several accessible parking spaces for your convenience. Children’s Beach also has an accessible concession stand, accessible restrooms and several accessible parking spaces. However, Jetties Beach is the only accessible beach in season.

The town installs Mobi Mats, which are access mats that create and accessible pathway for pedestrians and for visitors who use wheelchairs. These beach mats will not take you to the water’s edge, but they do allow access to the beach.

Many other Nantucket beaches have some accessible features such as accessible parking, accessible concession stand, and accessible restrooms. View  important information by available at each beach.

Beach Wheelchairs

The Town has beach wheelchairs for your use while visiting Nantucket. The Department of Public Works is responsible for managing these beach wheelchairs. The DPW will be happy to drop-off and pick-up a beach wheelchair for you to use for a day or up to one week.

These beach wheelchairs must be reserved in advance by emailing emailing the Department of Public Works or by calling the DPW 508-228-7244 Monday through Friday from 7:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. to request a reservation.

Parks, Trails, and Areas to Explore

There are numerous parks, trails, and scenic areas to explore while you’re visiting Nantucket. Most of our parks, trails, and scenic areas are not wheelchair accessible. Recently, students from Worcester Polytechnic Institute evaluated many outdoor spaces here on Nantucket for their level of access. They created a map of all the outdoor spaces that they evaluated for accessibility and provided a description of each location.

The Nantucket Islands Land Bank is incorporating accessible features on many of their properties, you can reach them at 508-228-7240.

The following Land Bank properties also have some accessible features:

  • Lily Pond: Accessible parking space, accessible walkway from the accessible parking space to the stone bench to enjoy the view of the open space.
  • East Creek Road: At the end of East Creek Road there is a parking area with an accessible parking space. The view is spectacular overlooking the creeks, harbor and Monomoy. There is a bench to enjoy the view, but presently there is not an accessible, paved route to the bench. You can still enjoy the incredible view from your vehicle and for some, the short distance to the bench is possible.

The Nantucket Conservation Foundation conserves many properties around the island. Two of the properties, Tupancy Links and Sanford Farm/Ram Pasture are popular destinations for residents and visitors. The trails can be rugged for anyone with an ambulatory concerns. However, there are parts of these properties where an all-terrain wheelchair would be capable of navigating the properties. Both properties have barriers at their main entrances prohibiting wheelchairs access at the main entrance. The Nantucket Conservation Foundation will gladly assist anyone who cannot negotiate the barriers by providing access at a different location on the properties. They will have to unlock a gate for your access so you must make arrangements with the Nantucket Conservation Foundation in advance of your visit to these properties. Please contact them during their normal business hours at 508-228-2844.

Bike Paths

There is a network of bicycle paths (PDF) that intersect the island and are wheelchair accessible. The paths offer scenic routes throughout the island.

Bike-path maps are available at all the local bike shops, Visitors Service Center and the Chamber of Commerce.