The Vero Beach Mooring Field

The Vero Beach mooring field is the City of Vero Beach's Managed Anchorage and Mooring Field, a set of rental moorings off the Municipal Marina on the Indian River Lagoon.

It is a city-run set of rental moorings in the Indian River Lagoon off the Vero Beach Municipal Marina, which the City of Vero Beach places on the east side of the lagoon just north of the Merrill Barber (Highway 60) Bridge, at Marker 139 on the waterway. The city calls the operation the Managed Anchorage and Mooring Field, or MAMF, and runs it from the marina office at 3611 Rio Vista Boulevard, open from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and reached at 772-231-2819 or 772-978-4960.

The field serves a mostly transient fleet. The City of Vero Beach describes its marina as a stop for more than 3,000 visiting boats each year, which together log about 20,000 overnights, and it rents moorings as well as slips on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. The marina lists its facilities and services as bicycle and vehicle parking, free bus service to town, a laundromat, mail drop and pick-up, a park with picnic shelters and barbecues, restrooms, showers, trash disposal, a TV lounge, waste oil disposal and Wi-Fi, and its 70 foot fuel dock sells gasoline and diesel and offers pump out, with fuel dock hours until 4:45 p.m.

What the city itself highlights about the Vero Beach field is the city's rafting policy, explained below, together with a firm 50-foot length limit and a published inspection cycle for the mooring hardware.

The City of Vero Beach established its mooring field in 1988, expanded it in 1997 and says it is looking at expanding it to the north.

The city gives that history on its Managed Anchorage and Mooring Field page that the mooring field was established in 1988 and expanded in 1997, and that the city is looking at expanding it to the north. The same page notes that rafting has been practiced for almost thirty years as a way to take in the large number of boats that call at Vero Beach in the cruising season.

Land use limits frame any expansion of the Vero Beach field. The City of Vero Beach zoning facts page explains that the City Marina and the Marina South Complex are zoned C-1M, Marina District, a district primarily for marina services with facilities oriented to users of the docks, moorings and watercraft. The same page says the City Marina is protected property under Section 5.05 of the City Charter, so marina land may be leased without a citizen referendum only for a public or civic purpose that also serves a recreational, artistic or cultural purpose, including incidental concessions.

Rafting means that from October through April the Vero Beach field may tie up to three boats to a single mooring.

The City of Vero Beach says that during the busier parts of the cruising season, from October through April, it may raft up to 3 boats per mooring, depending on the size and type of each vessel and the prevailing weather. In practice that means a boat arriving at Vero Beach in midwinter may be assigned to tie alongside one or two other boats sharing a single buoy and pendant, rather than swinging alone.

The city presents rafting as a capacity tool rather than a preference, saying it has rafted boats for almost thirty years to accommodate the large numbers of vessels that visit the Vero Beach area.

Boaters who do not want to raft have an alternative, with a catch. The City of Vero Beach notes that some vessels anchor just north of the mooring field instead, but boats anchored there may not use the marina's facilities, including the dinghy dock, showers and laundromat. Anchoring there means doing without the shore services that Vero Beach mooring guests can use.

Each Vero Beach mooring is a city-maintained anchor, chain and foam buoy set, inspected underwater every year and closed to vessels over 50 feet.

The City of Vero Beach publishes the makeup of its moorings in some detail. Each one consists of an anchoring system, a half-inch galvanized mooring chain and a foam surface buoy supplied by Island Mooring Supply. On top of the buoy sit a jaw eye swivel, a shackle and a 4-inch stainless ring, and a 15-foot double braid pendant with an eye is attached to the ring for the boat to pick up. The city uses two kinds of anchoring system in the lagoon bottom off the Vero Beach marina: large concrete piles with a stainless eye jetted flush with the bottom, and helix anchors.

Maintenance follows a fixed schedule. The city conducts underwater inspections of the Vero Beach field every year, replacing all anchor shackles and removing bad chain links during each inspection. All mooring chains are replaced every third year regardless of condition, and buoys and top gear are replaced through the year as needed.

Size is capped. It is the policy of the Vero Beach Municipal Marina not to place vessels over 50 feet on a mooring, because, in the city's explanation, larger vessels carry much more sail area and create heavier wind loads in bad weather. For slips, the marina's rate schedule lists separate charges for vessels over 100 feet LOA.

A transient mooring at Vero Beach costs $23.36 per day, plus applicable taxes, under the schedule posted on October 15, 2026.

The Reservations and Rates page of the Vero Beach Municipal Marina, which links Marina Rate Increase Resolution 2025-48 and a rate sheet titled October 2025, states that rates are charged plus applicable taxes and are not subject to proration, and that Harbormaster approval is required for Extended Stay moorings. Longer stays fall under an Extended Stay arrangement that requires the owner or captain to register with the Harbormaster and receive permission to remain, pay an Extended Stay monthly mooring fee of $370.56 in advance and pay a $50.00 facilities fee for the month.

Those Extended Stay payments entitle the crew to use marina facilities for up to 30 days, renewable month to month with Harbormaster approval for no more than six consecutive months. The facilities listed are the dinghy docks, garbage disposal, restrooms and showers, and parking for no more than two vehicles per vessel. The vessel must stay in the City Marina mooring field for the full 30 days; a boat that leaves early gets no refund and may be charged the daily rate for the days it actually occupied the mooring. Extended Stay and facilities fees may not be prorated, and partial months are charged at the daily transient rate.

Check-in runs through the marina's Transient Dockage and Mooring Registration page, which offers an online form and asks for reservations at least 48 hours in advance, or 30 days in advance for multiple-vessel registrations. The City of Vero Beach recommends monitoring VHF Channel 16 and working Channel 66A on approach, and the marina publishes a separate letter for anchoring vessels.

Yes: the City of Vero Beach allows vessels to attempt to seek shelter on its moorings during hurricanes, one boat per mooring.

The rule is first come, first served, and only one vessel is allowed per mooring, so the October to April rafting practice does not apply when a storm is approaching the Indian River Lagoon.

The Vero Beach Municipal Marina rate schedule sets a separate storm and hurricane rate. Boaters who want to use the marina as an alternative storage location must first fill out and sign a Storm/Hurricane Policy Permit before the start of hurricane season (June 1 to November 30) or before any tropical disturbance in the Atlantic basin. Moorings used under the permit are charged at the Extended Stay monthly rate of $370.56 plus the $50 facility fee, for a period not to exceed 7 days, and completing the permit places a boat on a waitlist without guaranteeing that a Vero Beach mooring will be free when a storm arrives. Storm rates are per occurrence and only if space is available; the same section charges wet slips twice the daily dockage rate and dry storage $30.00 per foot per day, each for no more than 7 days.

Last verified: October 15, 2026, for the Vero Beach mooring field, by re-reading the city's Managed Anchorage and Mooring Field, Municipal Marina, Reservations and Rates, Transient Dockage and Mooring Registration and City Marina Zoning Facts pages.