Admit it. When you are driving down 280 looking at the gorgeous foothills off to the right, you have wondered "can I actually hike through those woods?". The answer is moving towards "maybe" as the News-Times is reporting here
A proposal to open the 23,000-acre Peninsula Watershed to greater public access is gaining broad support, with the notable exception of environmental groups, who criticize the plan for its potential to damage sensitive animal and plant species.
Elected officials in San Francisco and San Mateo County, government agencies, hikers and mountain bikers have lined up behind the project, unveiled in February by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, which owns and manages the vast refuge that runs from San Bruno to Woodside above the Crystal Springs reservoirs.
The watershed has been mostly off-limits since the SFPUC bought the property in 1930. The agency long claimed that allowing more people onto the land could threaten wildlife, such as the endangered marbled murrelet, and risk contaminating reservoirs that are key elements of the Hetch Hetchy Regional Water System, which serves 2.4 million people in the Bay Area.
Walking on our side along Sawyer Camp Trail is fun and healthy, but the other side looks totally cool. For once it appears the political animals in EssEff are in line with our local wild life variety pols!
Yep, there's a Facebook page for that:
Open the SF Watershed
https://www.facebook.com/opentheSFwatershed/info?tab=page_info
And, there's legend and lore about Lake Pilarcitos:
http://www.hmbreview.com/news/preserving-the-thin-green-line/article_dfc33ea2-0b2e-11e1-9786-001cc4c002e0.html
Posted by: Off-limits for more than a century | April 07, 2015 at 03:41 PM
Where can I sign up for the hike. I have been wanting to get over there for years and would be ready to go this weekend. It is sort of a joke that this all belongs to San Fran.
Posted by: resident | April 15, 2015 at 09:43 PM
Speaking of Crystal Springs, this is some story:
A juvenile mountain lion that managed to make its way into a quiet San Mateo neighborhood was safely captured and released after dozens of police and wildlife officials shut down an entire residential block to search for the animal Monday afternoon.
The approximately 2-year-old, 90-pound lion that was about 5 or 6 feet long, was spotted three times throughout the day before officials were finally able to contain and tranquilize it in a resident’s backyard on the 900 block of Palm Avenue, immediately south of Central Park.
“San Mateo police were first on scene and they were terrific, they handled it very well,” said Andre Hughan, a spokesman with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. “It is very unusual to see a lion this far in town.”
http://www.smdailyjournal.com/articles/lnews/2015-05-19/captured-mountain-lion-runs-wild-through-san-mateo-neighborhood/1776425143559.html
ps. I don't know where to sign-up, resident.
Posted by: Joe | May 19, 2015 at 01:54 PM