It’s Saturday afternoon at Lands End in San Francisco. We are tired from all the weeding, but we feel alive and satisfied. A red-tailed hawk hovers above us, as if to signal that it’s time to end the program. We … Read more
California's state park system is the largest and most diverse natural and cultural heritage holdings in the nation. Yet the century-and-a-half-old system has been in perpetual crisis mode for several decades, battered about by funding shortfalls and repeated threats of closures.
A 21st Century Gateway to Castle Rock State Park
Driving south along Skyline Boulevard (Route 35), the forest thick with Douglas fir and a green canopy of madrones casting shadows on the road, I find myself saying out loud, “I can’t believe I’m here.” Less than an hour ago … Read more
Thirty-Two Miles in the East Bay Hills
The Skyline Trail connects parks, people, and history.
San Francisco Opens a New Campground at Sunrise Point
Residents and advocates turn to the challenge of keeping it welcome.
Cleaning Up Toxic Sites Shouldn’t Clear Out the Neighbors
UC Santa Cruz Sociologist Lindsey Dillon says cleanup shouldn’t mean displacement.
Human-Caused Climate Change Severely Exposes the U.S. National Parks
Climate change has exposed the United States National Parks to hotter and drier conditions than the country as a whole, a UC Berkeley scientist writes.
Do Parks Push People Out?
Parks improve health and fight climate change. But not all parks affect a community in the same way — and the question is: “Who’s it for?”
The Discovery of the Oldest Redwood South of Mendocino Marks a New Era
The mammoth McApin Tree is not just the venerable elder in its grove. It’s thought the giant redwood holds within its fire-charred rings the surrounding forest’s formative secrets.
The Most Visited State Park System in the Nation Is Remaking Itself and Wants Your Buy-In
Seven years after the crisis, California State Parks tests out a new model.
Parks Are Our Shared Spaces, and It’s Easy to Take Them for Granted
So much of the good stuff in life happens in natural places, and it all depends on parks functioning properly in ways we can too easily take for granted.