Don’t let cabin fever turn to virus fever, parks officials say

If people don’t practice social distancing, more outdoor areas will close

Bay Area residents seeking an escape from their living rooms amid unprecedented shelter-inplace orders meant to control the COVID-19 outbreak are creating a new kind of stress: headaches for state and local officials scrambling to close or restrict access to outdoor areas, hoping to keep growing crowds from dulling the effect of social distancing.

As the third week of stay-home orders begins, with more likely to come, cabin fever was intensifying for many. Uncertainty is looming over parks systems that are currently open, and officials say visitors need to play by the new health

“We don’t have pool activities, we don’t have a gym in our apartment complex, so it’s like, what can we really do if we lose this (parks)?”

— Keyla R. of Newark

rules, or risk forcing more closures.

On Sunday morning, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office ordered that all 280 state parks be closed to all vehicles. State parks officials said in a statement that crowds at many state parks Saturday “made it impossible for the public to implement appropriate social/physical distancing practices.”

That announcement came less than two days after San Mateo County closed completely all 23 parks it manages, and after the

East Bay Regional Park District partially or fully closed 14 of its 73 parks. Earlier in the week, the U.S. Forest Service closed its recreational facilities in California, except for trailheads.

“We want to be able to provide people a place where they can get some fresh air and get out, but we all have to work together to keep these facilities open,” Don Rocha, director of the Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation Department, said Sunday.

Rocha said that for now, parks across Santa Clara County remain open, though that could change in the days and weeks ahead. Staffers and park rangers monitoring park use will be on the lookout for any folks congregating, not social distancing, or otherwise not following health orders.

“We are asking people to be conscientious when they go out to the parks,” Rocha said, adding that people still need to stick to the rules and shelter in place as much as possible after using a park.

“It’s not a vacation, it’s really providing an amenity for people to get out and get some fresh air and some exercise,” he said.

On Sunday at popular Mission Peak in Fremont, the parking lot at the Stanford Avenue trailhead was packed with cars, though many people coming off the trail said they had enough space to maintain social distance for much of their hike.

Keyla R. of Newark, who didn’t want to give her last name, was sweating with her boyfriend, Eric, as they headed back to their car.

She’s been off work and watching her 11-year-old daughter, so it was important to get out “for all of our sanity,” she said.

Keyla said she hopes Mission Peak and other parks remain open through the pandemic.

“What are we going to do, people like myself that live in a small, tiny twobedroom apartment?” she said. “There’s only so much freedom we can have.

“We don’t have pool activities, we don’t have a gym in our apartment complex, so it’s like, what can we really do if we lose this?”

Carlos Cabrera of Mountain View was about to hit the trail with his friend Mariana Lara.

“We were in the apartment for, like, two weeks. We just couldn’t take it anymore,” he said Sunday. “If you’ve got nothing else to do, like no work, no school, the only thing you think about is going out.”

Cabrera and Lara were idle after the restaurant they work for closed, and they’ve been living with family with young kids, so they’ve all been trying to be cautious about going out, Cabrera said.

If more regional and local parks were to close, “it would be really hard, because most people rely on these places to reduce stress,” he added. “Being in the park, it’s a good thing, as long as you keep your distance between each other.”

In the East Bay, most regional parks remained open, and park visitorship has been up, even as the park district is contending with staffing shortages amid the new health orders.

Robert Doyle, general manager of the East Bay Regional Park District, said this past weekend was “very, very busy,” but he added that he saw improvements in social distancing at parks, compared with the “massive overcrowding” a week earlier.

But with staff already reduced because of the COVID-19 outbreak and related shelter orders, Doyle said all of the park system’s bathrooms are closed. Water fountains are sheathed in plastic, and there may be less frequent trash collection, so it’s important visitors respect the parks by taking their trash out with them, he said.

“We’ve had some places where people have torn the plastic off of water fountains to get a drink either for themselves or their dog,” he said.

“We have a high volume of dog use, and that is both a social distancing problem … (and) a problem with people leaving bags of poop that we don’t have the staff to clean up, and we really want people to take that home,” he said.

Doyle said he’s been in communication with health departments in Alameda and Contra Costa counties, and said they’ll close parks if they get orders to do so, or if health orders are being violated.

“If we’re going to keep these parks open, and not have more closures, we need everybody to be very conservative (in following social-distancing and health recommendations),” he said.

In San Mateo County, 23 county-managed parks are closed to the public entirely, but parks spokeswoman Carla Schoof said there’s still plenty of places to get outside safely. Locals, however, will have to “consider going beyond your favorite” county park sites.

“A lot of city parks have their park grounds open. You can walk in the park, you can walk on the grass,” she said.

Schoof said people looking to stretch their legs can hit The Bay Trail, which “runs from the tip of the South Bay all the way up the Peninsula, with miles and miles of trails,” and also the California Coastal Trail, which runs through the region.

Doyle, of the East Bay parks district, said he was concerned that vehicle access closures from the governor at popular state parks, like Mount Diablo State Park, could push more people into nearby regional parks.

While parks were open Sunday, they could be closed quickly if conditions change or people violate health orders, he said.

“We’re managing this crisis in real time,” Doyle said. “We’re trying to get people to follow the rules for their own safety.”