Walking the Kortum Trail

On my first trip to Sonoma County I flew to SFO and drove north through San Francisco, across the Golden Gate Bridge, and through Marin County on the 101 freeway.

The next time I drove highway 1 up the coast and was stunned by the contrast. The Marin headlands are twisty and challenging, but then the road opens out to a series of ocean and grassland vistas inhabited mainly, it seems, by a few lucky cattle. How, I wondered, could such pristine coastline exist so near the megalopolis?

One especially magical stretch runs north from Bodega Bay, on the Marin/Sonoma county line, to Jenner at the mouth of the Russian River. If you park at Wrights Beach you can walk the last four miles to the river, along dramatic coastal bluffs, on a trail named for Bill and Lucy Kortum. When Bill died in 2015 the Press Democrat described him as a man “who spent most of his life fighting to rein in urban sprawl and protect public access to the coast” and “saved the landscape of Sonoma County.”

Recently, for the first time, I hiked the Kortum Trail end-to-end both ways. Here’s the view from Peaked Hill:

For that view, and for so much else that we love about Sonoma County, we owe thanks to Bill Kortum. It began in the early 1960s when his older brother Karl led the fight to stop the construction of a nuclear power plant on Bodega Head. Although I’ve changed my mind about the need for nuclear power, siting one on the San Andreas fault was a crazy plan. Thankfully that never happened.

We’re frequent visitors to Bodega Head, and we’d heard about the “Hole in the Head” — the excavated pit left behind when PG&E abandoned the project — but until recently we weren’t sure quite where it was. Turns out we’d driven right past it every time we made the hairpin turn on Westshore Road at Campbell Cove. What would have been a nuclear plant is now a tranquil pond enjoyed by waterfowl.

Many of the things we love about Sonoma County can be traced to the activism that began there, and has continued for fifty years, led or influenced by Bill Kortum.

The planned community at Sea Ranch would have blocked public access to 13 miles of coastline. That didn’t happen. Now there are six access trails.

The entire California coastline would look very different were it not for the oversight of the California Coastal Commission, established by voters in 1972 partly in response to the Sea Ranch controversy.

The Sonoma County landscape would look very different were it not for urban growth boundaries that restrict sprawl and encourage densification.

The shameful six-decade-long lack of a passenger rail system in the North Bay would have continued.

The 1200-mile California Coastal Trail would not be more than halfway complete.

I was a bit surprised to find no Wikipedia page for Bill Kortum, so I’ve created a stub, about which Wikipedia says: “Review waiting, please be patient. This may take 8 weeks or more.”

As a relative newcomer to Sonoma County I feel ill-equipped to write more of this history. Perhaps others who know more will add to that stub. Here are some of the best sources I’ve found:

– John Crevelli’s Fifty Year History of Environmental Activism in Sonoma County.

– Gaye LeBaron’s 2006 interview with Bill Kortum.

– The Press Democrat’s obituary.

You were nearing the end of your life when we arrived here, Bill. I never had the chance to meet you, or to thank you for having the vision to preserve so much that is special about this place, along with the will and political savvy to make it happen. We are deeply grateful.