Grove of the Old Trees in Sonoma County closed to vehicular traffic due to fire risks

The parking lot for the Grove of the Old Trees in west Sonoma County is now closed to ensure that visitors drawn to its tranquil redwoods don’t inadvertently set fire to the forest or cause some other sort of damage.

The protected grove in the hills of Occidental will remain open to foot and bicycle traffic. LandPaths, the nonprofit group that owns the land, also hopes to shuttle visitors from underserved communities to walk its quiet trails in organized excursions.

But after swelling numbers of visitors began leaving cars parked on bone-dry weeds along the narrow, one-way road to the grove, and some even smoked in the trees and lit candles there, LandPaths Executive Director Craig Anderson said there was no choice but to take action — painful as it was.

“We have to be really mindful that in this age of work-from-home with COVID, and with the drought and with climate change, we have to work to make access safe at every site, not only for the site but for our neighbors and for the resources,” Anderson said. “This is a ponderous decision on our part and on my part, but I don’t see anything else in this moment, with high fire danger, to do.”

The 48-acre property off Fitzpatrick Lane, a winding dead-end road off Joy Road, has been open to the public, free of charge, every day for 21 years. It was set aside after plans to log the grove galvanized neighbors, advocates and local officials. They succeeded in preserving it, in part through county Agricultural Preservation and Open Space Funds. It has since been augmented through additional acquisitions and is maintained by volunteer stewards on the “people-powered parks” model upon which LandPaths was founded 25 years ago.

Its existence has always required a delicate balance, given its location among rural residential properties, 1 1/2 miles from Joy Road, on a very narrow roadway that requires drivers to maneuver deftly to avoid redwoods at the road’s edge.

While its popularity has continued to increase, the grove has maintained a relatively low profile until recently. Its increasing presence on social media — combined with the exploding interest in open spaces during the pandemic shutdown — has helped drive more visitors.

When the Walbridge fire hit last August and burned into the valley floor of Armstrong Woods near Guerneville, it closed the gate on about a million visitors a year who usually come to see the towering redwoods there and hike the trails in neighboring Austin Creek State Recreation Area.

Some of those visitors have instead taken the road to the Grove of Old Trees, including one who arrived Friday as volunteers were posting closure signs. That person said someone at the state park had recommended the grove as an alternative, Anderson said.

The grove also was included on a list posted at the park of places where visitors might see redwoods while Armstrong Woods remains closed, said Michele Luna, executive director of the Stewards of the Coast and Redwoods.

She said visitors have been clamoring to get in but that ongoing hazard tree removal from the wildfire had repeatedly delayed the park’s reopening.

“I’m still hoping we open before winter,” Luna said Friday. “That’s the goal.”

In the meantime, more and more people found the grove of majestic trees, some 1,000 years or older, on Fitzpatrick Lane, said neighbor Don Hines, a longtime stewardship volunteer.

They weren’t huge numbers, but the tiny parking lot only accommodates about six vehicles and was overflowing with cars. There would usually be another 10 or 12 ditched toward the side of the road and even a tour bus, from time to time.

The grove has no restrooms, “which creates problems there,” he said. And if someone tried to tell those smoking or sitting with candles it was dangerous, “they’d say, ‘buzz off, not interested,’ ” he said.

“They don’t care, which is really disturbing and surprising. I would not have expected that. I can see how people might not be really aware of how high the risk factor is here, because they’re not used to it in their urban areas, but when it’s pointed out I would expect them to be that insensitive.

Said Anderson, the LandPaths director: “There’s been a whole new usership that is, let’s say, providing what we would consider unsafe users’ behavior.”

Anderson said LandPaths would reopen the parking lot when significant rainfall returned and, in the meantime, remained committed to its mission of ensuring that those who don’t usually have the opportunity to visit nature do, through trips to the Grove of the Old Trees.

“Access to open space needs to be fair, needs to be smart, needs to be thinking of the future while standing on the best of our past,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 707-521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.