SOUTH CAROLINA, USA — Cities along the South Carolina coast are getting prepared for visitors for the Labor Day Weekend during the pandemic.
Traditionally people head to the beach on holidays. This typically means large gatherings and crowds at tourist attractions.
Doctors have stated their concern for Labor Day Weekend saying it could play a big role in the number of cases we could see during the fall.
Some of the popular places to hang out during the holiday weekend is along the South Carolina coast.
News 19 check in with cities across the Palmetto State to see how they're planning on handling the weekend and what precautions they will have in place.
Hilton Head Island
One of the most popular locations on the South Carolina coast includes Hilton Head Island.
Joshua Gruber, the Deputy Town Manager for Hilton Head Island, says Memorial Day, Fourth of July and Labor Day are three of their most active days.
"Labor Day normally caps the end of our summer season, but we typically see it as kind of one of our busiest points throughout the year," said Gruber.
With the anticipated hot weather, they believe there will be many people heading to the beaches.
There's a couple of precautions the town is planning on implementing or have already implemented in preparations for this weekend to deal with crowds.
"A couple of our beach parking lots, particularly the ones that we see kind of the most traffic at, we hired private security," explained Gruber. "We've had them on throughout the course of this entire summer but we kind of had them ramp up a little bit in terms of having some additional presence in those parking areas."
The town will also be providing an overflow parking area for Coligny Beach. The University of South Carolina-Beaufort is allowing people to use their parking lot.
Palmetto Breeze, the town's local transit authority will provide shuttles from the school parking lot to the beach from 10 am until 3 pm on Saturday, Sunday and Monday.
Regarding crowds, Gruber says people have been doing a good job on Hilton Head Island staying spaced out from other people.
"A lot of times, people have been really good about when they get to the beach areas themselves, they'll be within their own little group and they'll be close within those little groups but those groups will spread themselves out from other groups that are on the beach," said Gruber.
People who are hanging out at businesses and restaurants on the island need to be aware the town has a mandatory mask ordinance for anytime folks are in an indoor commercial establishment.
Hilton Head Island is also continuing messaging to make sure people practice social distancing and wash their hands.
"We want you to come down, enjoy the last little bit of summer, enjoy being at the beach and trying to cool off from the hot weather that we know is coming, but do so in a safe manner," explained Gruber. "It's not just for yourself, it's also for others. Regardless of what your own personal beliefs are, it's a respect for other people and their concerns that drives us all to want to wear a mask and kind of keep our distance from other people."
Georgetown
The City of Georgetown tells News 19 the county has extended their face mask ordinance through September 8th.
While it's not directly correlated with Labor Day Weekend, the city is continuing to provide signs for businesses about face masks requirements.
The city is also not awarding any special event permits at this time.
Myrtle Beach
The City of Myrtle Beach says they're expecting occupancy to be "fairly high" over the holiday weekend.
The city has a traffic management plan for Ocean Boulevard. Additional law enforcement will be available as well.
Mark Kruea, the spokesperson for the City of Myrtle Beach, said in a statement, "We aren't expecting any problems, but we also did not want to be surprised by crowd size or anything else. With that in mind, we are taking all precautions for a safe holiday weekend for everyone."
The spokesperson went onto say, "We do still have a face mask requirement in place for public spaces. Visitors should expect to wear a face mask indoors at stores, restaurants, hotel lobbies and other enclosed public spaces. Face masks are not required on the beach, but they are required if you cannot achieve proper social distancing outside."
Kruea says they want to continue the trend of low coronavirus cases for their area.
The city has announced they've extended their mask ordinance to September 30th. For more on the ordinance, click here.
Charleston
The City of Charleston is also getting geared up for the Labor Day Weekend.
Many people are anticipating going to their beaches and visiting restaurants in businesses in the area.
City of Charleston Spokesperson Jack O'Toole said in a statement, "With Labor Day approaching, we're asking our citizens to stay focused on the three W's -- wash your hands, watch your distance and, please, wear a mask. Those are the best tools we have to fight this disease, as we've seen here in Charleston since our mask ordinance passed in June, with the new-case growth rate falling from 14% to less than 1% and hospitalizations down dramatically as well. So it's vital that we protect our progress and not lose that positive momentum over the long holiday weekend."