Brooks Park

Brooks Park itself, mid-1990s.

Brooks Park, a hilltop in Merced Heights, offers sweeping vistas of San Bruno Mountain and the ocean. In 1936, when Helen and Jesse Brooks built a home here, they shared the windswept grasslands and wildflower fields with few others. By the time the city purchased it in 1966 houses had sprouted over the surrounding hillsides, becoming the neighborhood now known as Ocean View-Merced-Ingleside (OMI).

Several dozen native plant species are still found on the rocky outcrops of this hilltop. Its lower slopes are covered by old dune sands that are stained brown by many centuries of weathering. Such well-developed sandy soils once supported rich grasslands of violets (Viola pedunculata) and poppies (Eschscholzia californica). Iceplant (Carpobrotus edulis) and annual grasses from the Mediterranean crowded out most of the native plants. The natives are coming back now that the Natural Areas Program of the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department and the Friends of Brooks Park have been planting the dune sands with native plants.

--Pete Holloran

Brooks Park from the east, mid-1990s.

Contributors to this page include:

Carlsson,Chris - Photographer-Artist

Carlsson,Chris - Photographer-Artist

Holloran,Pete - Writer

Gaar,Greg - Photographer-Artist

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