The City of Galveston says it has 32 miles of shoreline that attract hundreds of thousands of beachgoers over the Independence Day holiday weekend.
However, there's one stretch where the wildlife is all you would find.
"It is devastating," Sonya Porretto said. "I wish it would stop because these things keep continuing, and no one wants to give us reasons as to why."
Porretto owns Porretto Beach. More than 70 years ago, she said her father, Henry Porretto Sr., bought the property at the Seawall and Tenth Street during an auction.
"After gaming was closed, the city was in financial diers," Porretto explained. "They were eliminating a lot of the beachfront properties."
Since then, the privately owned beach has been a spot people can use for free. The small business, though, makes money off parking, beach chair, and umbrella rentals.
However, those dollars won't be coming in, and the beach space won't be used for the first time in 70 years. Porretto announced the beach wouldn't open this summer.
It's a decision she said began five years ago, when a city and park board drainage project began just east of their beach.
"It has caused severe flooding, and a lot of the expenses that we've had over the five years have been directed towards mitigating that flooding," Porretto said.
Some of those efforts to stop the water, Porretto said, include moving sand, pumping water, and even placing barriers such as hay bales. Despite this, Porretto said the water keeps coming, which is why she took the fight from the shore to the courtroom.
"Now it's been five years, and it causes subsurface and surface damage," Porretto explained. "We cannot continue to afford to take our ceding sand off the front of the beach."
Five years ago, Porretto filed a lawsuit over the drainage issues. Last month, a federal judge dismissed claims involving the Texas General Land Office.
The lawsuit, though, can proceed against the city and the park board. The city and the park board told ABC13 that they cannot comment on ongoing litigation.
"We just can't open it," Porretto said. "It's not something we want to do. We enjoy it. We enjoy having the public have some place to come."
Which is why, despite hundreds of thousands of visitors this weekend, one stretch of the island's shoreline is left to the wild, as Porretto Beach stays closed.