1.
Richmond, California
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Richmond is a city in western Contra Costa County, California, United States. The city was incorporated on August 7,1905, under the McLaughlin Administration, Richmond was the largest city in the United States served by a Green Party mayor. As of the 2010 U. S. Census, the population is at 103,710. The largest, Richmond, Virginia, is the namesake of the California city, the Ohlone Indians were the first inhabitants of the Richmond area, settling an estimated 5,000 years ago. The name Richmond appears to predate actual incorporation by more than fifty years, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad had its terminus at Richmond. The first post office opened in 1900, Richmond was founded and incorporated in 1905, carved out of Rancho San Pablo, from which the nearby town of San Pablo inherited its name. Until the enactment of prohibition in 1919, the city had the largest winery in the world, in the 1920s the Ku Klux Klan was active in the city. In 1930 the Ford Motor Company opened a plant called Richmond Assembly Plant which moved to Milpitas in the 1960s. The old Ford plant has been a National Historic Place since 1988, the city was a small town at that time, until the onset of World War II which brought on a rush of migrants and a boom in the industrial sector. Standard Oil set up here in 1901, including a what is now the Chevron Richmond Refinery and tank farm. There is a pier into San Francisco Bay south of Point Molate for oil tankers, the western terminus of the Santa Fe Railroad was established in Richmond with ferry connections at Ferry Point in the Brickyard Cove area of Point Richmond to San Francisco. Many of these lived in specially constructed houses scattered throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, including Richmond, Berkeley. A specially built rail line, the Shipyard Railway, transported workers to the shipyards, kaisers Richmond shipyards built 747 Victory and Liberty ships for the war effort, more than any other site in the U. S. The city broke many records and even built one Liberty ship in a five days. On average the yards could build a ship in thirty days, the medical system established for the shipyard workers at the Richmond Field Hospital eventually became todays Kaiser Permanente HMO. It remained in operation until 1993 when it was replaced by the modern Richmond Medical Center hospital, Point Richmond was originally the commercial hub of the city, but a new downtown arose in the center of the city. It was populated by many department stores such as Kress, J. C. Penney, Sears, Macys, during the war the population increased dramatically and peaked at around 120,000 by the end of the war. Once the war ended the workers were no longer needed
2.
Del Valle Regional Park
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Del Valle Regional Park is a park of the East Bay Regional Park District in unincorporated Alameda County, California, south of the city of Livermore. The park is 4,316 acres big, the park largely surrounds Lake Del Valle, an artificial reservoir made from the damming of Arroyo Valle, a small river. The lake provides a source of recreation for visitors including swimming, fishing, there are lifeguards present at designated swimming areas. The park also offers 28 miles of hiking, horseback, and bicycle trails, there are many prominent and locally famous cliffjumping locations around the lake including The Rock, The Swallow Bay Cliff, and The Pillars. All can be accessed through various trails surrounding the park, the park can be approached from Mines or Arroyo Road, where the parking meter is often broken. Del Valle Park at the EBRPD website
3.
Lake Chabot Regional Park
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Lake Chabot Regional Park is a regional park located in the southern Berkeley Hills in Alameda County, California. It is part of the East Bay Regional Parks system, Lake Chabot is a reservoir located in the park. The dam and reservoirs water are part of the East Bay Municipal Utility District water system, official Lake Chabot Regional Park website EBMUD official website
4.
Middle Harbor Shoreline Park
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Middle Harbor Shoreline Park is located on San Francisco Bay and the Port of Oakland entrance channel, west of downtown Oakland, California It is operated by the East Bay Regional Parks District. The park is primarily on land that was the site of the Oakland Naval Supply Depot. The Naval Supply Depot closed in 1998 and the property was transferred to the Port of Oakland, the interlocking tower from the railroads pier has been moved and partially restored as a small commemorative museum. The land was redeveloped for the park from 2002 to 2004, redevelopment of the land included restoration of beaches and creation of a lagoon. The mast of the USS Oakland is displayed at the entrance of the park, East Bay Regional Parks District, official Middle Harbor Shoreline Park website Map, 37°48′21″N 122°19′27″W
5.
Tilden Regional Park
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Tilden Regional Park, also known as Tilden Park or Tilden /ˈtɪldən/, is a 2, 079-acre regional park in the East Bay, part of the San Francisco Bay Area in California. It is between the Berkeley Hills and San Pablo Ridge, the park is managed by the East Bay Regional Park District, created from the first land the District purchased in 1936. Tilden Regional Park was named in honor of Charles Lee Tilden, Tilden Park is largely located within unincorporated areas of Contra Costa County, while parts of the park are within the cities of Oakland and Berkeley. Its steep valleys and dense stands of timber offer a rare wilderness experience so close to the city and its high ridges and peaks give wide views over the San Francisco Bay and inland across other preserved land to Mount Diablo. The eastern limit of the park is approximately at the crest of the San Pablo Ridge, the western boundary nearly follows the crest of the Berkeley Hills. Parts of the land had previously been cleared for agricultural use. In many places, exotic trees such as eucalyptus have been planted, there are also some relatively recently planted stands of giant sequoia. However, current conservation efforts are aimed at restoring native vegetation as much as possible, the East Bay Regional Parks District uses grazing as a means of vegetation reduction, with a herd of goats grazing each summer in Tilden. AC Transit bus line 67 from the Berkeley BART station runs into the park on weekends, the bus line stops at the Tilden Nature Area/Little Farm, Lone Oak Road, Lake Anza/Merry-Go-Round, and the Brazilian Room/Botanic Garden before returning to Berkeley. Prior to being a park, the lands that are now Tilden Park were ancestral lands of Ohlone Indians. Spanish explorers and Mexican ranchos drove the Ohlone off the land as ranching became the dominant activity in Wildcat Canyon, american ranchers of the late 1800s and early 1900s included the Curran family ranch and the Sweet Briar Dairy. The eucalyptus plantations within the park were planted around 1910 by Frank C, havens Eucalyptus, Mahogany, & Land Company. The first parkland was purchased by the East Bay Regional Park District from the East Bay Municipal Utility District on June 4,1936, the 2,162 acres purchased included land for Tilden Park, Lake Temescal and Robert Sibley Volcanic Regional Preserve. Upper Wildcat Canyon was officially named Charles Lee Tilden Regional Park on July 16,1936. At the June 4,1936 board meeting of East Bay Regional Park District, the meeting that authorized the land purchase. In doing so, they met their matching fund obligation in order to qualify for $1 million in relief funds for park development. From 1935 to 1941 a Civilian Conservation Corps camp, Camp Wildcat Canyon was located in what is now the Tilden Nature Area, the CCC crews built much of the parks earlier infrastructure and features including roads, trails, bridges, picnic areas, and golf course. Works Progress Administration crews built the Lake Anza dam and stone buildings including restrooms, the original Lake Anza beach house, the aesthetic of the park today is directly derived from the original work performed by the CCC and WPA
6.
Brooks Island
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Brooks Island is a 75-acre, mostly flat strip of land extending from a round hill which peaks at 160 ft in San Francisco Bay, located just south of the Richmond Inner Harbor in Richmond, California. The rock that forms the peak of the island is radiolarian chert underlain by limestone. All these rocks are part of the Franciscan Assemblage, the range as Albany Hill,3 miles south. The main portion of the covers a area of approximately 47 acres. A short distance from the southwest coast of the island is Bird Rock or Bird Island. The sandspit that extends for two miles west of the main island formed along a breakwater that was installed in the 1920s to preserve a deepwater channel to the Richmond Inner Harbor. During the last ice age San Francisco Bay was a valley, as sea level rose, the valley was flooded and Brooks Island was cut off from the rest of the East Bay. Although the island is small, there is a permanent spring. The island hosts salt marshes, tidal flats and has a rise of 160 ft and it is home to many bird species, including herons and egrets, and provides their nesting sites. Some parts of the islands are off limits to visitors to protect nesting sites, other names for the island include, Isla de Cármen, Rocky Island, Bird Island, and Sheep Island. Brooks Island is a habitat for harbor seals that stop at the island from their nearby rookery on the Castro Rocks, the first archeological excavation on Brooks Island was conducted by Nels Nelson of UC Berkeley in 1907. Coles estimates that the Ohlone occupation of the site may date more than 3,000 years. His study found bones from cormorants, ducks and other waterbirds, marine mammal bones included harbor seals, sea lions, porpoises and whales. These early residents used atlatls and harpoons with bone points, even though the mound showed evidence of large catches of fish, especially herring, there were no fishhooks found, indicating that perhaps nets were used. Mollusks such as mussels, oysters, and clams were a portion of the diet. Coless research showed that the use of the island was stable over a long period, kent Lightfoot of UC Berkeley is reanalyzing Coless material to determine whether seasonal patterns can be identified. The latest carbon-14 date from the material is about 300 years ago. Juan Manuel de Ayala conducted the first nautical survey of San Francisco Bay in 1775, however, Spanish records from that period do not mention any settlement on the island
7.
Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve
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The Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve is a 6, 000-acre park located north of Mount Diablo in Contra Costa County, California under the administration of the East Bay Regional Park District. The district acquired the property in 1973, the preserve contains relics of 3 mining towns, former coal and sand mines, and offers guided tours of a former sand mine. The 60 miles of trails in the Preserve cross rolling foothill terrain covered with grassland, California oak woodland, California mixed evergreen forest, and chaparral. From 1850 to 1906, the area was known as the Mount Diablo Coalfield, the area includes the remains of twelve coal mines and the sites of three long-gone coal mining towns. The Preserve contains over 200 miles of mine workings, the largest and oldest town, Nortonville, had a peak population of about 1,000. Somersville, Stewartville, West Hartley and Judsonville were located in valleys to the east, the sites of Stewartville and West Hartley are located on private property outside the eastern boundary of the Preserve. The mines were the Empire, Central, Star, Corcoran, Pittsburg, Manhattan, Eureka, Independent, Union, Black Diamond, Mt. Hope, and Cumberland. The coal produced was of a low grade, but for a time in the 19th century, was the readily accessible. Therefore, it was a valuable resource and powering the railroads, ships. The mineral was called black diamond. Coal mining activity ended as better-quality imported coal became affordable and as petroleum emerged as an energy source, after the coal mines closed, the towns were abandoned and the area was used mainly for cattle grazing. Rose Hill Cemetery, the resting place for over 200 residents of the coalfield, is located on a hillside between the Somersville and Nortonville townsites. Many of the burials were for children who died in epidemics of fever, typhoid fever, smallpox. Many of the gravestones have been stolen or destroyed by vandals, the coal mines are closed due to hazards posed by the age of the mines, the gases they produce, and their rock quality. However, a number of mine openings have been turned into public-access openings which allow visitors to look into the mines and, for some, the deepest public-access opening is known as Prospect Tunnel. Visitors can enter 200 feet of this made by miners searching for coal. In the 1920s, a mine producing high-quality silica sandstone was started by owner Marvin Greathouse on a hillside above the Somersville townsite and he sold the product to the Hazel-Atlas Glass Company which operated a plant in Oakland manufacturing glass containers. Hazel-Atlas eventually purchased the mine and operated it until about 1945, another sandstone mine in the Nortonville area produced sand used by the Columbia Steel mill in Pittsburg, California for steel casting
8.
Mission Peak
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Mission Peak Regional Preserve is a public park east of Fremont, California, operated by the East Bay Regional Park District. It is the summit on a ridge that includes Mount Allison. Mission Peak has symbolic importance, and is depicted on the logo of the City of Fremont and this park borders and overlooks Silicon Valley, and is popular with local hikers, bicyclists, sightseers from the Bay Area, and tourists from beyond for its vista and strenuous climb. The Mission Peeker marker pole at the summit is the most famous and geo-tagged landmark in the City of Fremont, the Stanford Avenue entrance receives up to two thousand visitors per day on weekends. Visitor numbers surged after 2010, and it is the most popular attraction in Fremont, a full six-mile round-trip ascent on a popular trail takes two to five hours for walkers, one to one-and-a-half hours for bicyclists and runners. Difficulty with the sun, such as dehydration, is not uncommon. Guidelines recommend carrying two liters of water per person, extra water for dogs, and sun protection, signs prohibit off-trail shortcuts which can cause erosion, and some shortcuts have barbed wire fencing to reduce trespassing. Three trails climb the northern and western faces. The Hidden Valley Trail which draws the lions share of visitors and they have an elevation change of 2,100 ft, with panoramic views of the Bay Area but are sun exposed with little shade. The Stanford Avenue entrance has water and restrooms, no food, water bottles or supplies are sold at the park. The Park District is directing visitors to the Peak Trail which starts at Ohlone College and this has an elevation change of 2,100 ft, and is 10% longer than the Hidden Valley Trail. The Peak Trail entrance has restrooms but no water, paid parking at Ohlone College is not congested, nor are the miles-long pedestrian trails inside the park proper. Most access the park one of two nearby freeways,680 and 880. and Stanford Avenue from Fremont BART. The two least popular approaches originate from Sunol Regional Wilderness and Ed R. Levin County Park in Milpitas, the Sunol route climbs 2,200 ft over five miles, a gentler grade than Hidden Valley Trail which climbs 2,100 ft over three miles. The Levin County Park route first climbs 2,200 ft from the Park HQ to Monument Peak over three miles, and from there Mission Peak is another three miles to the north along a flat trail. This route passes beside Mount Allison, the tallest of the three peaks, Mount Allison is about 170 ft higher than Mission Peak, but not open to the public. Depending on weather conditions, Bay Area peaks including Mount Diablo, Mount Hamilton, furthermore, the peak provides good views of Oakland, San Jose, San Francisco, and Fremont. On very clear days, the Sierra Nevada range are visible 100 miles to the east, Mission Peak connects to a network of regional trails and contains part of the Bay Area Ridge Trail, which is under construction and has gaps to the north of Mission Peak
9.
Las Trampas Regional Wilderness
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Las Trampas Regional Wilderness is a 5, 342-acre regional park located in Alameda and Contra Costa counties in Northern California. Las Trampas is Spanish for the traps, the park belongs to the East Bay Regional Park District. It consists of two long, hilly ridges flanking a narrow valley along Bollinger Creek which contains a horse stable, some of the hiking trails include steep sections, they can involve as much as 900 feet of elevation change. The park has been described as the guy of the East Bay Regional Park District. Bicycles are allowed on half of the trails, equestrians and hikers on all of the trails, cows, calves, steers and an occasional free-ranging bull can be encountered on the trails, their grazing keeps the grass short for summer fire safety. Deer, coons, and skunks can be seen, as well as hawks, vultures, the commonest trees are California bay laurel and coast live oak. Some of the rocks contain compressed layers of fossils. The eastern section of the park contains several secluded waterfalls. The western-slope portion of Las Trampas is a sensitive EBMUD watershed and is closed to hiking except by permit, Las Trampas Regional Wilderness official web page Topographic trail map of Las Trampas Regional Wilderness James Kew, resident alien
10.
Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline
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Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline is a 295-acre bayside park in the Brickyard Cove neighborhood of the Point Richmond District in Richmond, California. The park is centered on the Miller/Knox lagoon which is depicted on a large 200 foot by 50 foot mural at the Richmond Municipal Natatorium nearby. The park affords views of the Bay Area especially the Oakland and San Francisco skylines, islands, bridges. The views are the farthest from the high point, Nicholls Knob. The regional shoreline includes Keller Beach on San Pablo Bay in addition to picnic and barbecue areas, parking. There is also a train ferry pier and other assorted ruins. The park is home to the Golden State Model Railroad Museum. The park is named for state senator George Miller, Jr. and former State Assembly member. The park features many trails for cyclists, dog-walkers, and hikers, and a salt water lagoon where ducks, seagulls, the beach was closed due to an Cosco-Busan oil spill in 2007, but reopened months later. Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline - at the East Bay Regional Parks District website
