Old Fisherman's Wharf has two calendars running this fall. The Fisherman's Wharf Association has scheduled a birthday party, a Halloween night and three weekends of Christmas. Meanwhile, the City of Monterey's crews are back at the timber piles and concrete foundations. The overlap is deliberate. A permit condition bars repair work on Wharf 1 between Memorial Day and Labor Day. That leaves autumn and winter for the work, and those are also the months the wharf saves for its own community events.
So this fall, events on the deck and repairs underneath share the same stretch of the calendar.
The summer rule that sends crews back in September
The city calls the job the Wharf 1 Immediate Repairs project. Its scope is "various structural elements" of the wharf. The City of Monterey's public works construction page says, in its update for the week of September 7, 2026, that the project was suspended for two reasons. Crews were waiting on materials, and the permits allow no work between Memorial Day and Labor Day. The city expected work to resume the week of September 14, 2026.
The Monterey Herald reported on September 28, 2026 that the repairs were continuing. The work covers timber pile repairs, concrete foundation fixes and handrail replacements. The City Council awarded the construction contract to Sweetwater Construction Inc. in July 2025 for $983,389.
Two things are still unknown. Neither the city update nor the Herald gives a completion date, and neither says which sections of the wharf or which businesses are closest to the work. Nobody has publicly said when the job will finish, so plans for the coming months can't count on a finish date.
Why the list under the deck got long
The July 2025 contract came a few months after the Monterey County Civil Grand Jury examined Old Fisherman's Wharf and the Commercial Wharf. KSBW's April 2025 coverage reports that the Grand Jury rated both wharves in "poor" structural condition.
Its numbers explain why this year's scope starts with piles. Engineering reports from 2017 and 2024 found eight urgent repair sites on Wharf 1. Over that period, the share of bearing piles needing repair rose from 70% in 2017 to 81% in 2024. The Grand Jury listed several causes of the delays: deferred action, gaps between the city's evaluations and leaseholders' evaluations, multi-agency permitting, and too little funding.
The money comes from the wharf itself. By law, revenue from the wharves pays for operations, construction and maintenance across the broader Tidelands area. The city's Tidelands Fund took in $3.3 million in lease revenue in 2024. As of the 2025 report, it faced a $17 million shortfall for wharf repairs over the following five years. Those figures date from spring 2025 and describe why the work started. They are not a measure of the wharf's condition this October.
The timber has failed before. The city's harbor history page recounts March 3, 1923, when 20,000 cases of sardines sat on Fisherman's Wharf waiting for the S.S. San Antonio. The weather was rough, and the ship leaned so hard against the timbers that 132 feet of pier collapsed. Half the cargo went into the harbor. The rebuild that followed added 750 feet and a finger pier running east.
The landlord is the city, and the restaurants pay for the pilings
The city owns the wharf, and it has for about a century. The history page says the City Council took over the pier in 1913 to keep it in better repair, and by 1916 the city had bought it and created the office of Wharfinger. When the sardines disappeared after World War II, the wharf turned to visitors. By 1956 it held restaurants, gift and candy shops, a theater and fish markets.
Every restaurant on the deck is therefore a city tenant, and its lease payments go into the fund that repairs the structure it sits on. One of the best-known of those leases changed hands this fall.
Monterey County NOW reported that Sal Tedesco retired after 32 years at Paluca Trattoria, 6 Fisherman's Wharf, and that Mike Yaley took over as owner on September 1. Tedesco joined in 1994 as general manager of what was then The Captain's Gig. The restaurant was opened in the early 1960s by Monterey chef John Pisto and was known for its fish and chips. Tedesco and his wife, Ashley, later bought it and turned it into an Italian seafood restaurant.
"This has been my home. It's been good to me," Tedesco told the paper. "The time has come."
Tedesco said the timing came partly from the lease. His lease with the city was up for renewal, and selling won out over the other options. The City Council's July 7, 2026 agenda included a closed-session real property negotiation for 6 Fisherman's Wharf, Suite C, the Paluca Trattoria space.
Diners will see little change for now. Yaley's wife's family was part of the ownership for more than 20 years. He plans to rename the restaurant The Gig eventually, as a nod to its past, and to keep the menu as it is. "Seafood and pasta," he said. "I'm not going to fix something that's not broken." The kitchen team is staying, along with most of the waitstaff.
The deck's calendar, October through December
With repair crews working again, the Fisherman's Wharf Association has filled the same months with free events. The Association is counting 2026 as the wharf's 181st anniversary. That count comes from the Association, and the city's history page dates the steamship company's wharf to 1870. The two use different starting points, so the 181 is best read as the Association's tradition.
| Date | Event | Where and when | Details from the organizers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sun., Oct. 11 | 181st Wharf Birthday Party | Old Fisherman's Wharf, 201 Washington St., 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. | Free; live entertainment at the head of the wharf, activities for all ages, a historic boat, new activities this year |
| Sat., Oct. 24 | 7th annual California Seaweed Festival | Old Custom House Plaza, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. | Free; talks, demos, seaweed tastings; first time in Monterey |
| Sat., Oct. 31 | Halloween on the Wharf | 201 Washington St., 4 to 7 p.m. | Free; trick-or-treating and a costume contest with cash prizes |
| Fri., Dec. 4 to Sun., Dec. 20 | 10th annual Christmas on the Wharf | Old Fisherman's Wharf, three weekends | Free; Santa House, a 23-foot tree, weekend performances, decorations up all month |
The Association's events page lists details and contact information, including (831) 238-0777 for the birthday party. The Association also says the Christmas schedule will keep changing.
The festival next door is about what's under the water
The Seaweed Festival is on Old Custom House Plaza, off the deck itself, but its subject is the water around the pilings. Per the festival's site, this year's theme is "Dive In." It describes Monterey Bay's kelp and other seaweed forests as the base of a food web that runs from sea otters to abalone. It also says the kelp forests along the Monterey Peninsula "have dramatically declined."
The program preview includes a Derisking Seaweed Aquaculture Panel and a flash-talk series called Seaweed Science Flash Talks: Kelp Forests in a Changing Ocean. The site also lists short-film screenings and sells tickets for workshops and tours. The wharf's event listing notes that the festival moves to a different coastal town each year, so Monterey has it this October only.
December on a working wharf
Christmas on the Wharf runs three weekends, from Friday, December 4, through Sunday, December 20. The display has a wooden "under the sea" scene, the 23-foot tree, a cascading ceiling of lights, a Santa House and holiday inflatables.
The announced performances so far:
- Peninsula Harmony Company, in vintage costume, from 6 to 7 p.m. on December 4, 5, 11, 12, 18 and 19
- Pacific Pop 'n Jazz and Saxophonia, Saturday, December 5, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Carmel Dance's Musical Performance Troupe, December 5 from 3 to 5 p.m. and December 12 from 2 to 4 p.m.
- U-Jam Fitness Jingle Jammers with GEMZ Dance Fitness, Sunday, December 6, 3 to 4:30 p.m.
- Matsiko World Orphan Choir, Saturday, December 12, noon to 1 p.m.
The Association invites guests to bring folding chairs and says well-behaved dogs on leashes are welcome.
Those weekends fall in the same months the repair permit allows crews to work, on a contract the city awarded more than a year ago, beneath a deck the Grand Jury rated "poor" in 2025. The city hasn't published an end date, so the closest thing to a progress report is the next construction update on the City of Monterey's public works page.
Whether you go down to the wharf for the birthday party or for a plate at The Gig once the new name goes up, it helps to know what's being done to it. If you're thinking about a home near the harbor, or about how Monterey's waterfront figures into selling one, Susan Clark is glad to talk through what she has seen along this shoreline over three decades. Request Your VIP Listing Consultation.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
