As the nation’s produce basket, California’s Central Valley grows more than a third of the country’s vegetables and almost all of its almonds, pistachios, and walnuts, along with many other crops. What it has almost none of are state parks. Governor Gavin Newsom is trying to fix that.
In April, Newsom announced State Parks Forward, the biggest expansion of California’s state park system in decades. Three new state parks spanning roughly 330 miles across the Central Valley have been unveiled—pushing the state’s total to 283, more than any other state in the country—in addition to a plan to add 30,000 acres to existing parks by the end of the decade.
Indeed, three existing parks also received significant land additions as part of the same initiative:
- Montgomery Woods State Natural Reserve in Mendocino County gained 453 acres of second-growth coast redwood forest.
- South Yuba River State Park in Nevada County welcomed 218 extra acres, finally bringing the beloved Independence Trail—which was the first wheelchair-accessible wilderness trail in the country when it opened—fully within park boundaries.
- Pigeon Point Light Station State Historic Park on the San Mateo coast more than tripled in size, with 133 extra acres of coastal bluffs, extending the California Coastal Trail through some of the most dramatic shoreline in the state.
None of the three new parks is open yet. The California Department of Parks and Recreation will spend the coming months gathering public input before submitting formalized plans to the governor this fall. Taken together, the three sites tell three unique stories about what California is and what it could be if it continues to nurture its public lands.
Feather River Park, Olivehurst (Yuba County)
Feather River Park will become the first-ever state park to open in California’s central Yuba County, bringing greater visibility to nearly 2,000 acres of lush riverfront.
Photo by Brian Baer/Courtesy of California State Parks.
Yuba County has roughly 85,000 residents and, until now, zero state parks. The forthcoming Feather River Park will sit on nearly 2,000 acres of restored riparian land along the Feather River, home to valley oaks, cottonwoods, river otters, and waterfowl and currently managed as a floodplain by the local levee authority. As a state park, it would open a boat launch and a riverside beach to a community that has had no comparable public outdoor space.
San Joaquin River Parkway (Fresno and Madera Counties)
San Joaquin River Parkway boasts a network of vibrant nature trails.
Photo by Brian Baer/Courtesy of California State Parks
Just north of Fresno, the San Joaquin River Conservancy has spent decades assembling public land along the river on which you can take guided canoe tours, nature walks, and hike trails where you might spot black-crowned night herons or Native American grinding stones worn into riverside boulders. The infrastructure is already there. What’s been missing is a unified identity that makes it legible to visitors as a destination rather than a collection of disconnected properties. Consolidating these parcels into a single 874-acre state park, positioned alongside nearby Millerton Lake State Recreation Area, would give the Central Valley something it has lacked: a genuine, named, findable place to spend a day on the water.
Dust Bowl Camp, Bakersfield (Kern County)
For the first time, the public will be able to step foot into this living piece of history.
Photo by Brian Baer/Courtesy of California State Parks
The Sunset Migratory Labor Camp, listed on both the National Register of Historic Places and the California Register of Historical Resources, was built in 1936 by the Farm Security Administration to house displaced farmworkers fleeing the Dust Bowl. John Steinbeck visited repeatedly, and it became the primary inspiration for The Grapes of Wrath, which he dedicated in part to the camp’s administrator, Tom Collins, with the words “To Tom, who lived it.” Woody Guthrie played here. Dorothea Lange photographed here. Kern County’s Dust Bowl migrant community gave rise to the Bakersfield Sound, a sub-genre of country music, and musician Merle Haggard, the genre’s defining voice, and the son of Dust Bowl refugees.
Three original buildings survive: the community hall, the library, and the post office. They are the only remaining structures from any Dust Bowl–era labor camp in California, and one appeared in the 1940 film adaptation of the novel. The site is roughly two acres, currently owned by the Housing Authority of Kern County, and has never been open to the public. When it officially becomes a state park, for the first time, anyone will be able to enter a building that Steinbeck walked into, in a place that still houses migrant farmworkers in 88 units yearly, specifically May through October.
The bottom line
At a moment when the federal government is pulling back from national parks and public lands, California is moving in the opposite direction, guiding that expansion squarely at communities that have historically been last in line for access to the outdoors. Whether you come for a float down the Feather River or a walk through a piece of American literary history, these parks are worth watching and—once they finally open (possibly as early as later this year)—visiting. For updates on public engagement opportunities regarding these new and expanded parks, visit parks.ca.gov/forward.
