Park District Announces Geocaching Guidelines

My favorite park district, the East Bay Regional Park District, developed their own set of geocaching guidelines and posted them on their website this week. The Park District spans Alameda and Contra Costa counties east of San Francisco with 108,000+ acres in 65 parks including over 1,200 miles of trails for hiking, biking, horseback riding and nature study. 

The Park District has always been friendly to the geocaching community, and it's no coincidence that a good chunk of my overall cache finds have been on EBRPD land. It was nice to see them come out with their own set of geocaching guidelines, to not only acknowledge that they support caching on EBRPD land, but to ensure that geocaching is conducted in a responsible and sustainable manner within their jurisdiction.


For the most part, the EBRPD guidelines are based on the standard Groundspeak guidelines, but they've also included a few of their own, such as:

• Caches shall be clearly labeled with “Geocache” on the exterior;
• Cache containers shall be of a “neutral” nature so as not to cause alarm or concern;
• Caches that have been abandoned or not maintained will be considered as litter and removed by the District;
• Caches shall not be placed in a way that causes the development of new “unofficial” trails;
• Caches are not allowed within 100’ of streams, lakes, marshes, or wetlands.

Kudos to the Park District for developing these guidelines, which could serve as a model for other park agencies. Are you listening National Park Service?


Cache On!