The Trail Companion

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The San Jose Mercury News reported on June 16, 2000, that Coyote Lake County Park - currently less than 100 acres, but popular for camping, picnicking, fishing, and boating - will become one of the larger parks in the system with an added 3,679 acres of adjacent ranchland recently purchased for $14 million. The Bear and Mendoza ranches adjoin Henry Coe State Park, and form part of a major acquisition - 9,234 acre -- by the Santa Clara County Open Space Authority and the Nature Conservancy aimed at preventing development across valuable blue oak habitat at the eastern edge of the Silicon Valley conurbation. Planning is underway for the expanded park and may include a golf course on 200 mostly flat acres at Foothill and San Martin Aves., although Lisa Killough of SC County Parks noted that the process has just begun and will include a series of public meetings on land use, probably beginning in October.
      The new properties are not currently open to the public and no formal trails yet exist, but up to $500,000 of Proposition 12 funds are earmarked to construct trails, trailheads, and parking, and to provide non-vehicular public access between the Bear and Mendoza Ranch open space and adjacent Henry Coe State Park. Included in the trail plans will be a new Bay Area Ridge Trail link between Coyote Lake and Henry Coe State Park.
      The Nature Conservancy is working to resell the remaining 6,100+ acres of the 1999 purchase to California State Parks for annexation by Henry Coe State Park. See the Nature Conservancy's project page for more information on the Conservancy's Mount Hamilton Project, which will protect around Mt. Hamilton and throughout the Hamilton Range.

The Trust for Public Land. recently purchased a 534-acre property adjacent to Alum Rock and intends to transfer ownership to the SC County Open Space Authority for addition to the park. The new property, which is part of the Penitencia Creek watershed, will provide an important link for the Bay Area Ridge Trail and provides sweeping views of the Santa Clara Valley.

Over 200 volunteers came out for the Alum Rock Trail Restoration Program's first big event on National Trails Day, June 3rd. Many years ago, the park had a dedicated group of volunteers maintaining trails, but the program fell into a lull for many years, partly due to major damage in the park in the El Nino storms. Volunteer Ken Ford (who worked on our Todd Quick Trail project in 1993) and enthusiastic parks staff have reinvigorated the program and are holding monthly work sessions, generally on the last Saturday of each month. For NTD, over 200 young people from San Jose's City Year program joined eighteen community volunteers for creek cleanup and trail maintenance. The Bay Area Ridge Trail Council will join park volunteers this summer in maintenance and construction on a new segment of the Ridge Trail, which will be dedicated in October.
      For more information, contact Park staff at 277-4539 or e-mail Ken Ford or Bob Powers (BARTC).

Amphion Environmental, an environmental consulting firm based in Oakland, has begun to create a Trails Master Plan for Arastradero Preserve and intends to have a finished recommendation by October. Concurrently, Thomas Reed & Associates is creating a comprehensive map of the preserve, based on data collected by Bay Area Action and others, which will include all existing trails (both official and unofficial), soils and plant communities.
      Amphion held a workshop on the Preserve on June 15 for all interested trail users, featuring three separate self-guided tours (one each for hikers, bicyclists and equestrians) that visited representative trails throughout the lower Preserve. Participants answered a series of questions regarding access, trail design, maintenance, and general Preserve conditions. They also made additional written comments about favorite areas, as well about as barriers to enjoying the Preserve. Amphion will compile the answers and present them in a second public workshop on Wednesday, July 26, 7:00 - 9:00 p.m. at the Palo Alto Art Center, 1313 Newell Road. For more details and a survey questionnaire, see the announcement on the City's website.

Bay Area Action's Arastradero Preserve Stewardship Project sponsors weekly restoration sessions at Arastradero through the summer. Meet at the parking lot at 6 p.m. on Wednesday evenings to help reduce the infestations of yellow starthistle and other noxious weeds, as well as collect native grass seeds and maintain first-year plantings.

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