San Mateo County shuts down its parks

As park managers in the Bay Area dial in the protocols for public access during the coronavirus pandemic, San Mateo County is shutting down all 23 of its parks until further notice.

“The decision to close parks is not easy, especially now when people are looking for outdoor experiences, but the safety of San Mateo County residents must always be a priority,” San Mateo County Parks Director Nicholas Calderon said.

Over the past two weeks, San Mateo County has kept 17 of its parks open, but rangers observed clusters of hikers, Calderon said, many who drove separately to parks and then met as a social event. The county’s shelterinplace order permits certain outdoor activities as needed for fitness and health, so long as social distancing rules are observed.

Meanwhile, the California Department of Parks and Recreation reopened trails Monday in the Bay Area — with the caveat that visitors must walk or ride a bicycle to trailheads.

Most of the more than 20 agencies and districts that manage more than 150 recreation destinations in the greater Bay Area are settling on rules that allow access to trails at parks, open space and watershed lands as long as visitors walk or ride bikes to get there. Many access roads and parking lots at parks are closed to

vehicles.

With some variation, closures to vehicles and parking include all state parks, most of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Point Reyes National Seashore and Marin County Parks and Open Space.

All access is shut down at Alcatraz, all state parks in Sonoma County, and at San Pablo, Lafayette and Los Vaqueros reservoirs in the East Bay, and Loch Lomond Reservoir in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

The most permissive rules are on the Peninsula, where the Peninsula Open Space District and Santa Clara County parks have no closures in place. That could change, a ranger on the Peninsula said, if parking lots overflow as warm weather returns, or if an increase in mountain bike accidents last week continues this weekend.