Moving to Coronado
2 movers, $119 an hour cash. No deposit. An island in everything but geography, with a Navy town underneath the resort. What it is actually like to live here, written by a moving company that has been carrying furniture in and out of it since 1997.
By the Discount Movers Team · Updated August 2026 · Licensed California household mover · CAL-T #201759 · BBB A+ Rated
Who Lives Here
Who Moves
To Coronado
Navy and Marine families attached to North Island and the Amphibious Base, second-home owners, and long-tenured residents who have watched the village stay much the same.
The Housing
What You
Are Buying Into
The Village is period housing on small lots, cottages and Craftsman homes alongside condominium buildings near the beach and the Shores. The Cays, four miles down the Silver Strand, are 1970s waterfront housing with a completely different feel and their own access rules.
The Trade-offs
What Nobody Mentions
Until You Have Signed
Every neighborhood is a trade. These are the ones people actually notice in the first year.
The bridge is the only road, unless you take the Strand
Both are fine until they are not. Plan around events and rush hour.
It is a small town with a resort economy
Quiet most of the year, busy in summer and on event weekends.
PCS season sets the rhythm
Housing turns over on military timing here more than on the calendar.
Village streets are narrow and parking is finite
A second car is a genuine decision, not an assumption.
Move Day
Getting Your Furniture
Into Coronado
Village streets are tight and the Cays are a separate trip down the Strand. Both benefit from an early start, and neither takes a full size truck comfortably in every block. Our Coronado movers page covers the access detail street by street, and what a move costs is one page with the whole rate card on it: $119 an hour cash or $129 by card for two movers, a three hour minimum of $357 at the cash rate, a flat $75 fuel fee, and no deposit at any point.
Utilities and Trash Service in Coronado
Trash, recycling and organic waste in Coronado are picked up at the curb by EDCO, which holds the city's solid waste contract. The city's Curbside Residential Service page lists 619-287-7555 as the EDCO customer service number for starting service at a new address. Collection is skipped on some holidays, and each one pushes pickup a day later for the rest of that week. If your move-in week includes one of those dates, the carts go out a day after the normal day.
Gas and electric come from SDG&E, which the city's Utilities page names as the provider for both. Water is not a city service. The Coronado system is run by California American Water, whose call center is 1-888-237-1333, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday, with online account setup through its MyWater tool. Sewer is a city charge, and the city collects it through the San Diego County property tax roll rather than as a separate monthly bill, so it shows up on the property tax statement instead of in a utility account.
Unpacking is when people find the paint cans and the dead batteries. Coronado runs a Household Hazardous Waste drop-off on the second and fourth Saturday of each month, 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., at the Public Services Facility at 101 B Avenue, open to Coronado residents only. For furniture and other items too large or heavy for the carts, the city schedules Bulky Waste curbside collection weeks twice a year, once in spring and once in fall. Anything that has to leave before the next scheduled week is your own trip to a disposal site.
Parking Permits and Street Rules
Some blocks of Coronado require a residential parking decal. The city's Parking page says residents in those areas get the decal free at the Police Department front counter, Monday through Friday except holidays, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. The page does not describe an online or mail option, so plan a weekday stop once you have something showing the new address, and ask at that counter whether your block is in a decal zone at all before you assume one way or the other.
The same page covers Oversized Vehicle permits, which matter if you are driving a rental truck yourself. A permit is good for 48 hours, carries no fee, and requires that the vehicle be loaded in preparation for a trip or unloaded after one, and parked at the residence where the permit was issued. Residents may obtain up to three Oversized Vehicle Guest Permits per calendar year, again in person at the Police Department. The page also states the permit cannot be used for commercial purposes, so do not assume it covers a hired mover's truck. Ask the department before move day.
The one date to keep a move away from is July 4. The city's parade road closure FAQ says Orange Avenue closes between First Street and R.H. Dana Place, with crossings only at Third and Fourth streets, and the 100 and 200 blocks of D through J avenues are blocked or restricted. Per the city's Fourth of July page, vehicles left along the parade route, the staging areas, Glorietta Boulevard or Strand Way that morning are towed that morning, and the parade steps off at 10 a.m. at First and Orange and runs about two hours.
Getting Around Without the Bridge
Coronado's local bus is MTS Route 904, the Coronado Shuttle, which runs from the Ferry Landing to City Hall along Orange Avenue. In 2026 the city's Free Summer Shuttle program made it free from June 7 through September 7, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily, at 20 minute intervals. The city's 2026 Free Summer Shuttle notice is the source, and the dates are set each year, so check the current notice rather than this one.
For downtown San Diego without crossing the bridge in a car, MTS Route 901 runs between the Iris Avenue Transit Center and downtown by way of Imperial Beach and Coronado. The other option is on the water. The city's Alternative Transportation page describes a city-subsidized ferry for pedestrians and bicyclists between the Coronado Ferry Landing and the Broadway Pier in San Diego. Neither carries furniture, but both are worth knowing on the days you would rather not sit in bridge traffic.
Schools, the Base and the Library
Coronado Unified runs four schools: Coronado High School, Coronado Middle School, Village Elementary and Silver Strand Elementary, listed on the district's Our Schools page. New students enroll through the district's online registration for 2026-27 rather than at a school office. Confirm with the district which elementary serves your address before you commit to housing chosen around a particular school, and do the registration early enough that the paperwork is not competing with the move itself.
The base at the north end of the island is not a small posting. Navy Region Southwest's NAS North Island page describes it as host to 23 aviation squadrons and 80 additional tenant commands and activities, one of which, Fleet Readiness Center Southwest, is San Diego's largest aerospace employer. That scale is what sits behind the answer above about who moves to Coronado, and it is why the Navy calendar shapes so much of the town's rhythm.
The Coronado Public Library at 640 Orange Avenue is open Sunday 1 to 5 p.m., Monday through Thursday 9:30 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday 9:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.. Down the Strand, Coronado Cays Park is a six-acre neighborhood park on Silver Strand Boulevard with an off-leash dog run and pickleball courts, which the city describes as one of its busiest, mostly for youth sports.
FAQ