Santa Fe Right of Way

How the Santa Fe came to Berkeley: The Santa Fe Right of Way started as the narrow-gauge California & Nevada Railway in the 1880s. Intended to reach the Colorado mines, it never got past Orinda. But in the early 20th Century, the Santa Fe system took over the line and used it for passenger and rail service between Oakland and Richmond. This let it compete with the first transcontinental rails, Union Pacific, whose rails to Sacramento ran along the shoreline. Dwindling rail traffic eventually doomed the Santa Fe system. It shut down in the 1970s. Much of the right of way was taken over by the then-new BART system. Where BART was elevated, from Albany to Richmond, this led to a new pedestrian-bicycle path under the tracks.

In Berkeley, however, citizens taxed themselves to put BART underground, and the route veered east through downtown Berkeley. This left most of the Santa Fe right of way west of Sacramento unused. After several attempts to get Berkeley to buy it, the railroad gave most of it to the city. It became part of a long-drawn-out struggle, sometimes tumultous struggle involving opposition to low-income housing, downzoning to stop developers from replacing small homes with apartments, and West Berkeley’s relative lack of parks and open space.Under public pressure, which at times approached riots, the strip over the BART tunnel became long green Ohlone Park instead of a site for Berkeley Community College. North of the North Berkeley BART station and its parking lots, the BART route gradually was ceded to tennis courts, community gardens, and a narrow pedestrian-bicycle path that hooked up to the broader one under the tracks in Albany. What had been the Santa Fe railroad yard, south of University Avenue, became Strawberry Creek Park, were the nascent urban-creeks movement carried out what is generally considered California’s first “daylighting” — opening a creek buried in a pipe to nature and sunshine. A few low-income units were built and scraps of the right-of-way sold off to odd-shaped lots. Eventually, a requirement that no public open space could be converted without a popular vote was written into the General Plan.

The trail from University Avenue north: The rail right of way between University Avenue and to Cedar Rose Park was plagued by litter, vandalism, camping, and crime including use by prostitutes from still-scruffy University Avenue. Fences blocked it near University and at Lincoln Street.

In 2006, the city had built a first path segment, from University Avenue to Delaware, leaving a small mountain of soil found to be toxic because the railroad had long killed weeds with arsenic-based herbicides. (The issue lingers.) Neighbors were complaining about neglect and misbehavior.

In 2008, Friends of Five Creeks’ volunteers began years of pulling and digging tall weeds and planting drought-tolerant, pollinator-friendly natives in the two blocks between Berkeley Way and Delaware. Besides demonstrating environmentally friendly planting, the change greatly reduced litter and vandalism along the trail. The city kept its promise to build a structure that would allow the trail to be closed — the scaffolded frame north of University Avenue –but it has not been used.

At Lincoln Street, where railroad fill over Schoolhouse Creek created steep slopes, hidden nooks for campers, and easy escape for petty criminals. F5C and Berkeley Path Wanderers had worked together to clean up and maintain the trail on both sides of the fence. Path Wanderers used a grant to install a solar light. Working with the then-powerful Berkeley Parks Commission, volunteers went house to house polling neighbors; at a well-attended public meeting, neighbors allowed the fence to be opened in 2007. This made it possible to walk or cycle from University north to Albany, although the soil heap remained and part of the way was unpaved.

The city finally paved the connection north of Delaware in 2012. Threatened with losing a state grant because of delays, planners rammed it through with none of the promised input from neighbors, who had ideas from landscaping to a safe place for kids to learn to ride bikes. Years later, neighbors rallied as Friends of West Street Park rallied and now work to make the route more attractive. At Path Wanderers’ urging, the connection south from University Avenue to Strawberry Creek Park was opened in 2014.

F5C no longer maintains this project. Most of our native plantings have been lost to weeds, mowing, and herbicides used by neighbors. The path, however, well used and reasonably maintained, mostly by city mowing. Our efforts were important steps leading to acceptance and final construction of this popular, well used rails-to-trails project. See photos of our work here.