Baxter Creek

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The Northern terminus of the Ohlone trail at Baxter Creek Park.

Baxter Creek or Stege Creek^[1] and archaicly Bishop Creek^[1] is a three-branch creek in Richmond and El Cerrito, California, United States forming the Baxter Creek watershed. The creek has three sources and flows from the Berkeley Hills to Stege Marsh and the San Francisco Bay. The Baxter Creek watershed at-large has 10 sources.^[2]

The creek has been largely culverted over the years since the Rancho San Pablo and the subdivided Bishop Ranch, then known as Bishop Creek, were developed urbanly. This caused the residents to miss the creek as it disappeared under the asphalt and the Friends of Baxter Creek formed. This group has restored several portions of the creek at Baxter Creek Park, Pointsett Park, and Booker T. Anderson Park to a pristine Riparian condition, however the Anderson Park portion has been ravaged by litter and shopping carts.^[3][4]

The Ohlone Greenway bicycle and pedestrian path has its northern terminus at Baxter Creek Gateway Park, located just north of where the BART tracks cross over San Pablo Avenue in Richmond.

The exact origin of the name Baxter Creek is unknown, but historians believe it to be from a family which once owned land in the area. Stege is from Richard Stege and Bishop comes from Thomas Bishop which owned large tracts of land in the past.^[5]

[edit] See also

• Cerrito Creek
• List of watercourses in the San Francisco Bay Area
• Richmond Greenway

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

• Friends of Baxter Creek
• Creek History
• UC Davis/Baxter Creek
• Baxter Creek at the Museum of California
  • map 1
  • map 2
• Baxter Creek at the State of California

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