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118-822: The Diablo Range extends from the Carquinez Strait in the north to Orchard Peak and Polonio Pass in the south, near the point where State Route 46 crosses over the Coast Ranges at Cholame , as described by the United States Geological Survey (USGS). It is bordered on the northeast by the San Joaquin River , on the southeast by the San Joaquin Valley , on the southwest by the Salinas River , and on

236-612: A cataclysmic flood. The strait forms part of the county border between Solano (to the north) and Contra Costa (to the south), and it is approximately 15 mi (25 km) north of Oakland . The cities of Benicia and Vallejo lie on the north side of the strait, while Martinez , Port Costa , and Crockett sit on the southern coast. The Napa River joins the strait, via the short Mare Island Strait , near its entrance into San Pablo Bay. Its watershed covers 62,500 square miles (162,000 km ), approximately 40 percent of California's total surface. The California Maritime Academy

354-543: A decade there is seriously deep and long lasting snowfall. Mercury contamination near the southern end of the range is an ongoing problem, due to the New Idria quicksilver mines, which stopped production in the 1970s. Heavy mercury contamination has been documented in the San Carlos and Silver Creeks, which flow into Panoche Creek , and thence into the San Joaquin River . This has resulted in mercury contamination all

472-615: A first in the United States, and four years later a majority of voters in the Bay Area rejected California Proposition 8 , which sought to constitutionally restrict marriage to opposite-sex couples but ultimately passed statewide. The Bay Area was also the center of contentious protests concerning racial and economic inequality . In 2009, an African-American man named Oscar Grant was fatally shot by Bay Area Rapid Transit police officers , precipitating widespread protests across

590-409: A hotbed of progressive politics . Economically, the post-war Bay Area saw large growth in the financial and technology industries, creating an economy with a gross domestic product of over $ 700 billion. In 2018 it was home to the third-highest concentration of Fortune 500 companies in the United States. The Bay Area is home to approximately 7.52 million people. The larger federal classification,

708-555: A significant earthquake hazard. Among the more well-understood faults, as of 2014, scientists estimate a 72% probability of a magnitude 6.7 earthquake occurring along either the Hayward, Rogers Creek, or San Andreas fault, with an earthquake more likely to occur in the East Bay's Hayward Fault. Two of the largest earthquakes in recent history were the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake . The Bay Area

826-416: A significant presence throughout the region. Most of the remaining two-fifths of the population is non-Hispanic White American . The most populous cities of the Bay Area are San Francisco, Oakland , and San Jose , the latter of which had a population of 969,655 in 2023, making San Jose the area's largest city and the 13th-most populous in the United States . Despite its urban character, San Francisco Bay

944-622: A single county, Alameda. Diverse assemblages adjoin in complex arrangements due to offsets along the many faults (both active and stable) in the area. As a consequence, many types of rock and soil are found in the region. The oldest rocks are metamorphic rocks that are associated with granite in the Salinian Block west of the San Andreas Fault . These were formed from sedimentary rocks of sandstone , limestone , and shale in uplifted seabeds. Volcanic deposits also exist in

1062-470: A total of about 700. More recent studies estimate the total death count to be over 3,000, with over 28,000 buildings destroyed. Rebuilding efforts began immediately. Amadeo Peter Giannini , owner of the Bank of Italy (now known as the Bank of America ), had managed to retrieve the money from his bank's vaults before fires broke out through the city and was the only bank with liquid funds readily available and

1180-764: Is a narrow tidal strait located in the Bay Area of Northern California , United States. It is part of the tidal estuary of the Sacramento and the San Joaquin rivers as they drain into the San Francisco Bay . The strait is eight miles (13 km) long and connects Suisun Bay , which receives the waters of the combined rivers, with San Pablo Bay , a northern extension of the San Francisco Bay. The strait formed in prehistoric times, near

1298-787: Is accepted by most local governmental agencies including San Francisco Regional Water Quality Control Board , Bay Area Air Quality Management District , the San Francisco Bay Restoration Authority , the Metropolitan Transportation Commission , and the Association of Bay Area Governments , the latter two of which partner to deliver a Bay Area Census using the nine-county definition. Various U.S. Federal government agencies use definitions that differ from their local counterparts' nine-county definition. For example,

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1416-550: Is at the western end of the strait on the northern waterfront. The C&H Sugar refinery is located on the southern shore in the small town of Crockett . The strait is crossed by two highway bridges: the Carquinez Bridge on Interstate 80 and the Benicia–Martinez Bridge on Interstate 680 . Each highway bridge consists of two spans. Interstate 780 connects the two highways on the northern slope of

1534-637: Is dominated with nonnative invasives. Blooming in spring are such plants as Viola pedunculata , Dodecatheon pulchellum , Fritillaria liliacea , and Ribes malvaceum , which can be viewed in the Blue Oak Ranch Reserve . The range's riparian zones have such trees as bigleaf maple ( Acer macrophyllum ), white alder ( Alnus rhombifolia ), California bay ( Umbellularia californica ), and California sycamore ( Platanus racemosa ). The most common trees are coast live oak ( Quercus agrifolia ) and blue oak ( Quercus douglasii ), with

1652-618: Is held in conservation easements by the California Rangeland Trust . Since the range lies around 10–50 miles (16–80 kilometers) inland from the ocean, and other coastal ranges like the Santa Lucia Range and the Santa Cruz Mountains block incoming moisture, the range gets little precipitation. In addition, the average elevation of 3,000 feet (910 m) is not high enough to catch most of

1770-800: Is home to a complex network of watersheds, marshes, rivers, creeks, reservoirs, and bays that predominantly drain into the San Francisco Bay and Pacific Ocean. The largest bodies of water in the Bay Area are the San Francisco , San Pablo , and Suisun estuaries. Major rivers of the North Bay include the Napa River , the Petaluma River , the Gualala River , and the Russian River ; the former two drain into San Pablo Bay ,

1888-468: Is largely influenced by the cold California Current , which penetrates the natural mountainous barrier along the coast by traveling through various gaps. In terms of precipitation , this means that the Bay Area has pronounced seasons. The winter season, which roughly runs between November and March, is the source of about 82% of annual precipitation in the area. In the South Bay and further inland, while

2006-405: Is one of California's most ecologically sensitive habitats, providing important ecosystem services such as filtering the pollutants and sediments from rivers and supporting a number of endangered species . In addition, the Bay Area is known for its stands of coast redwoods , many of which are protected in state and county parks. The region is additionally known for the complexity of its landforms,

2124-781: Is paralleled by other sections of the California Coast Ranges to the west, the Santa Cruz Mountains across the southern San Francisco Bay and Santa Clara Valley, and the Santa Lucia Range across the Salinas Valley . The East Bay Hills are bounded geologically by the Calaveras Fault to the east and the Hayward Fault to the west. The range passes through Contra Costa , Alameda , San Joaquin , Santa Clara , Stanislaus , Merced , San Benito , Fresno , Monterey , and Kings Counties, and ends in

2242-624: Is part of the Baldwin Deepwater Shipping Channel . The narrow gap in the Coast Range that forms the strait has led to the formation of the San Joaquin–Sacramento River Delta , an inverted river delta , upstream of it, a rare geological feature. The strait is too small to allow the passage of huge amounts of floodwaters created during years with heavy rainfall or snowmelt events. Because

2360-561: The Allied Powers was signed in San Francisco, entering into force a year later. In the years immediately following the war, the Bay Area saw a huge wave of immigration as populations increased across the region. Between 1950 and 1960, San Francisco welcomed over 100,000 new residents, inland suburbs in the East Bay saw their populations double, Daly City 's population quadrupled, and Santa Clara 's population quintupled. By

2478-521: The Bay Bridge , which would connect San Francisco with Oakland and the East Bay. After the United States joined World War II in 1941, the Bay Area became a major domestic military and naval hub, with large shipyards constructed in Sausalito and across the East Bay to build ships for the war effort. The Army's San Francisco Port of Embarkation was the primary origin for Army forces shipping out to

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2596-475: The Central Valley counties of San Joaquin , Merced , and Stanislaus . The Bay Area is known for its natural beauty, prominent universities, technology companies, and affluence. The Bay Area contains many cities, towns, airports, and associated regional, state, and national parks, connected by a complex multimodal transportation network. The earliest archaeological evidence of human settlements in

2714-624: The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) which regulates broadcast, cable, and satellite transmissions, includes nearby Colusa , Lake and Mendocino counties in their " San Francisco - Oakland - San Jose " media market , but excludes eastern Solano County. On the other hand, the United States Office of Management and Budget , which designates metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) and combined statistical areas (CSA) for populated regions across

2832-640: The Hayward Fault Zone , Concord-Green Valley Fault , Calaveras Fault , Clayton-Marsh Creek-Greenville Fault , Rodgers Creek Fault , and the San Gregorio Fault . Significant blind thrust faults (faults with near vertical motion and no surface ruptures) are associated with portions of the Santa Cruz Mountains and the northern reaches of the Diablo Range and Mount Diablo . These "hidden" faults, which are not as well known, pose

2950-662: The Hayward fault , and the Diablo Range , which includes Mount Diablo and Mount Hamilton and runs along the Calaveras fault . In total, the Bay Area is traversed by seven major fault systems with hundreds of related faults, all of which are stressed by the relative motion between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate or by compressive stresses between these plates. The fault systems include

3068-679: The North Pacific High through the Golden Gate, which creates the city's characteristic cool winds and fog . The microclimate phenomenon is most pronounced during this time, when fog penetration is at its maximum in areas near the Golden Gate strait, while the South Bay and areas further inland are sunny and dry. Along the San Francisco peninsula, gaps in the Santa Cruz Mountains , one south of San Bruno Mountain and another in Crystal Springs, allow oceanic weather into

3186-556: The Pacific Ocean on the west and the bay on the east and are characterized by their mountainous and woody terrain. Sonoma and Napa counties are known internationally for their grape vineyards and wineries , and Solano County to the east, centered around Vallejo , is the fastest growing region in the Bay Area. The " Peninsula " subregion includes the cities and towns on the San Francisco Peninsula, excluding

3304-709: The Pacific Theater of Operations . That command consisted of fourteen installations including Fort Mason, the Oakland Army Base , Camp Stoneman and Fort McDowell in San Francisco Bay and the sub port of Los Angeles. After World War II, the United Nations was chartered in San Francisco, and in September 1951, the Treaty of San Francisco to re-establish peaceful relations between Japan and

3422-604: The San Joaquin River Delta , causing a cooling effect in Stockton and Sacramento , so that these cities are also cooler than their Central Valley counterparts in the south. The Bay Area is home to a diverse array of wildlife and, along with the connected San Joaquin River Delta represents one of California's most important ecological habitats. California's Dungeness crab , Pacific halibut , and

3540-547: The Summer of Love . In the proceeding decades, the Bay Area would cement itself as a hotbed of New Left activism, student activism , opposition to the Vietnam War and other anti-war movements , the black power movement , and the gay rights movement . At the same time, parts of San Mateo and Santa Clara counties began to rapidly develop from an agrarian economy into a hotbed of the high-tech industry . Fred Terman ,

3658-885: The Tamien of the South Bay. The Miwok had two major groups in the Bay Area: the Bay Miwok of Contra Costa and the Coast Miwok of Marin and Sonoma . In 1542, Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo explored the Pacific coast near the Bay Area though the expedition did not see the Golden Gate or the estuaries, likely due to fog. Sir Francis Drake became the first European to land in the area and claim it in June 1579, when he landed at Drakes Bay near Point Reyes. Even though he claimed

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3776-673: The University of California, Berkeley Richard Walker claimed that "no other U.S. city-region is as definitionally challenged [as the Bay Area]." When the region began to rapidly develop during and immediately after World War II , local planners settled on a nine-county definition for the Bay Area, consisting of the counties that directly border the San Francisco , San Pablo , and Suisun estuaries : Alameda , Contra Costa , Marin , Napa , San Francisco , San Mateo , Santa Clara , Solano , and Sonoma counties. Today, this definition

3894-544: The combined statistical area of the region which includes 13 counties, is the second-largest in California—after the Greater Los Angeles area—and the fifth-largest in the United States, with over 9 million people. The Bay Area's population is ethnically diverse: roughly three-fifths of the region's residents are Hispanic/Latino , Asian , African/Black , Indian , or Pacific Islander , all of whom have

4012-476: The osprey . In 1927, zoologist Joseph Grinnell wrote that osprey were only rare visitors to the San Francisco Bay Area, although he noted records of one or two used nests in the broken tops of redwood trees along the Russian River . In 1989, the southern breeding range of the osprey in the Bay Area was Kent Lake , although osprey were noted to be extending their range further south in

4130-575: The west coast of the United States , including populations residing in tributaries to San Francisco Bay. California Coast Chinook salmon were historically native to the Guadalupe River in San Francisco Bay, and Chinook salmon runs persist today in the Guadalupe River, Coyote Creek , Napa River , and Walnut Creek . Industrial, mining, and other uses of mercury have resulted in a widespread distribution of that poisonous metal in

4248-581: The 1800s. There still are numerous coyotes and some of the more vital mountain lion populations in the state. There are excellent populations of bobcats and gray foxes , which depend on the chaparral habitat. A species of millipede, Illacme plenipes , is endemic to the southern Diablo Range. First described in 1926, then not seen again until 2005, the species has more legs than any other species of millipede, with one specimen having 750. Carquinez Strait The Carquinez Strait ( / k ɑːr ˈ k iː n ə s / ; Spanish : Estrecho de Carquinez )

4366-587: The 1980s an effort to re-introduce the species to the area began with the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group and the San Francisco Zoo importing birds and eggs from Vancouver Island and northeastern California, and there are now nineteen nesting couples in eight of the Bay Area's nine counties. Other once absent species that have returned to the Bay Area include Swainson's hawk , white tailed kite , and

4484-539: The Bay Area as including the nine counties that border the estuaries of San Francisco Bay, San Pablo Bay , and Suisun Bay : Alameda , Contra Costa , Marin , Napa , San Mateo , Santa Clara , Solano , Sonoma , and San Francisco . Other definitions may be either smaller or larger, and may include neighboring counties which are not officially part of the San Francisco Bay Area, such as the Central Coast counties of Santa Cruz , San Benito , and Monterey , or

4602-517: The Bay Area dates back to 8000–10,000 BC. The oral tradition of the Ohlone and Miwok people suggests they have been living in the Bay Area for several hundreds if not thousands of years. The Spanish empire claimed the area beginning in the early period of Spanish colonization of the Americas . The earliest Spanish exploration of the Bay Area took place in 1769. The Mexican government controlled

4720-521: The Bay Area during this period. In 1806, a Spanish expedition led by Gabriel Moraga began at the Presidio, traveled south of the bay, and then east to explore the San Joaquin Valley . In 1821, Mexico gained its independence from Spain and the Bay Area became part of the Mexican province of Alta California , a period characterized by ranch life and visiting American trappers. Mexico's control of

4838-647: The Bay Area played a major role in America's war effort in the Asiatic-Pacific Theater , with the San Francisco Port of Embarkation , of which Fort Mason was one of 14 installations and location of the headquarters, acting as a primary embarkation point for American forces. Since then, the Bay Area has experienced numerous political, cultural, and artistic movements, developing unique local genres in music and art and establishing itself as

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4956-581: The Bay Area their home, making the region a popular destination for birdwatching . Many birds are listed as endangered species despite once being common in the region. Western burrowing owls were originally listed as a species of special concern by the California Department of Fish and Game in 1979. California's population declined 60% from the 1980s to the early 1990s, and continues to decline at roughly 8% per year. A 1992–93 survey reported little to no breeding burrowing owls in most of

5074-577: The Bay Area, all naturally spawned anadromous steelhead populations below natural and manmade impassable barriers in California streams from the Russian River to Aptos Creek , and the drainages of San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bays are listed as threatened under the Federal Endangered Species Act . The Central California Coast coho salmon population is the most endangered of the many troubled salmon populations on

5192-663: The Bay Area, in the Lost Coast . The expedition followed the coast southward and on November 7 the San Agustin anchored in Drakes Bay, and claimed the region as Puerto y Bahía de San Francisco . In late November, a storm sank the San Agustin and killed between 7 and 12 people. On December 8, 80 remaining crew members set sail on the San Buenaventura , a launch which was partially constructed en route from

5310-420: The Bay Area, left behind by the movement of the San Andreas Fault, whose movement sliced a subduction plate and allowed magma to briefly flow to the surface. The region has considerable vertical relief in its landscapes that are not in the alluvial plains leading to the bay or in the inland valleys. The topography, and geologic history, of the Bay Area can largely be attributed to the compressive forces between

5428-458: The Bay. The wild turkey population was introduced in the 1960s by state game officials, and by 2015 have become a common sight in East Bay communities. The Bay Area is well known for the complexity of its landforms that are the result of the forces of plate tectonics acting over of millions of years, since the region is located in the middle of a meeting point between two plates. Nine out of eleven distinct assemblages have been identified in

5546-424: The California scorpionfish are all significant components of the bay's fisheries . The bay's salt marshes now represent most of California's remaining salt marsh and support a number of endangered species and provide key ecosystem services such as filtering pollutants and sediments from the rivers. Most famously, the bay is a key link in the Pacific Flyway and with millions of shorebirds annually visiting

5664-554: The Central Valley and the Sierra Nevada. In 2014, a Bay Area-wide survey found osprey had extended their breeding range southward with nesting sites as far south as Hunters Point in San Francisco on the west side and Hayward on the east side, while further studies have found nesting sites as far south as the Los Gatos Creek watershed, indicating that the nesting range now includes the entire length of San Francisco Bay. Most nests were built on man-made structures close to areas of human disturbance, likely due to lack of mature trees near

5782-414: The Central Valley city of Tracy . South of Pacheco Pass, the only major nearby communities (those with a population over 15,000) are Los Banos , and Hollister . The small town of Coalinga may also be notable for its location on State Route 198 , one of the few routes through the mountains. Also the town of Kettleman City is also on State Route 41, another route that crosses the mountains. Towns west of

5900-426: The Delta area is the first to fill and last to drain in a flood event, silt and soil have more time to drop out of suspension, creating the inverted river delta feature. Seawater is more dense than fresh water because of its higher concentration of salts. Under stable conditions, this means that an invisible boundary forms where two such streams meet, as where the fresh water from Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers meet

6018-444: The Diablo Range include knobcone pine ( Pinus attenuata ), Jeffrey pine ( Pinus jeffreyi ) and ponderosa pine ( Pinus ponderosa ). The Diablo Range attracts far more raptors than coastal forests, such as red-tailed hawks . Golden eagle nesting sites are found in the Diablo Range, reaching their highest density in southern Alameda County. The Bay checkerspot butterfly , a federally listed threatened species , has habitat in

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6136-404: The East Bay Hills consists of the Briones Hills furthest north, then the Berkeley Hills , the San Leandro Hills centrally, and Walpert Ridge and Pleasanton Ridge to the southwest and southeast, culminating at Alameda Creek / Highway 84 . Geologically, the Diablo Range corresponds to the California Coast Ranges east of the Calaveras Fault in its northern section. For much of its length, it

6254-408: The East Bay receives oceanic weather that travels through the Golden Gate strait, and further diffuses that air through the Berkeley Hills , Niles Canyon and the Hayward Pass into the Livermore Valley and Altamont Pass . Here, the resulting breeze is so strong that it is home to one of the world's largest array of wind turbines . Further north, the Carquinez Strait funnels the ocean weather into

6372-425: The Gold Rush subsided, wealth generated from the endeavor led to the establishment of Wells Fargo Bank and the Bank of California , and immigrant laborers attracted by the promise of wealth transformed the demographic makeup of the region. Construction of the First transcontinental railroad from the Oakland Long Wharf attracted so many laborers from China that by 1870, eight percent of San Francisco's population

6490-405: The North Bay, northern East Bay, and Central Valley. Ohlone villages were spread across the Peninsula, East Bay, South Bay, as well as further south into the Monterey Bay area. There were eight major divisions of Ohlone people, four of which were based in the Bay Area: the Karkin of the Carquinez Strait , the Chochenyo of the East Bay , the Ramaytush of the San Francisco Peninsula , and

6608-434: The Pacific Plate and the North American plate. The three major ridge structures in the Bay Area, part of the Pacific Coast Range , are all roughly parallel to the major faults . The Santa Cruz Mountains along the San Francisco Peninsula and the Marin Hills in Marin County follow the San Andreas fault , The Berkeley Hills , San Leandro Hills and their southern ridgeline extension through Mission Peak roughly follow

6726-420: The Philippines . Seeking the fastest route south, the expedition sailed past the Golden Gate, arriving at Puerto de Chacala, Mexico on January 17, 1596. The Bay Area estuaries remained unknown to Europeans until members of the Portolá expedition , while trekking along the California coast, encountered them in 1769 when the Golden Gate blocked their continued journey north. Several missions were founded in

6844-701: The Range, especially at Mount Diablo. The California tiger salamander ( Ambystoma californiense ), also a federally threatened species and a vulnerable species of amphibian native to Northern California , lives in ponds in the range. The northern Pacific rattlesnake is thriving, as are many ground squirrels , hares , and various species of native and nonnative rodents. Tule elk ( Cervus canadensis ssp. nannodes ) were restored to Mount Hamilton between 1978-1981 and are slowly recovering in several small herds in Santa Clara and Alameda Counties. See Mount Hamilton elk recovery . Black-tailed deer are abundant. Pronghorn , grizzly bears , and wolves were extirpated in

6962-413: The San Francisco Bay Area are not officially delineated, and the unique development patterns influenced by the region's topography , as well as unusual commute patterns caused by the presence of three central cities and employment centers located in various suburban locales, has led to considerable disagreement between local and federal definitions of the area. Because of this, professor of geography at

7080-439: The Santa Clara Valley, Livermore Valley and San Joaquin Valley are typically 400–1,000 feet (120–300 m). Canyons are usually 300–400 feet (91–122 m) deep; valleys are often deeper but less steep-sided. Peaks often have high topographic prominence, as they are surrounded by valleys or lower hills or plateaus. Streams draining the eastern slopes of the Diablo Range include Hospital Creek and Ingram Creek . Stream draining

7198-436: The Whale , a humpback whale who entered San Francisco Bay twice on errant migrations in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Bottlenose dolphins and harbor porpoises have recently returned to the bay, having been absent for many decades. Historically, this was the northern extent of their warm-water species range. In addition to the many species of marine birds that can be seen in the Bay Area, many other species of birds make

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7316-456: The area from 1821 until the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo . Also in 1848, James W. Marshall discovered gold in nearby mountains , resulting in explosive immigration to the area and the precipitous decline of the Native population . The California Gold Rush brought rapid growth to San Francisco . California was admitted as the 31st state in 1850. A major earthquake and fire leveled much of San Francisco in 1906. During World War II ,

7434-471: The arts. It is also host to numerous higher education institutions, including research universities such as the University of California, Berkeley , and Stanford University , the latter known for helping to create the high tech center called Silicon Valley . Home to 101 municipalities and 9 counties, governance in the Bay Area involves numerous local and regional jurisdictions, often with broad and overlapping responsibilities. The Coyote Hills Shell Mound,

7552-590: The bay has been significantly altered heavily re-engineered to accommodate the needs of water delivery, shipping, agriculture, and urban development, with side effects including the loss of wetlands and the introduction of contaminants and invasive species . Approximately 85% of those marshes have been lost or destroyed, but about 50 marshes and marsh fragments remain. Huge tracts of the marshes were originally destroyed by farmers for agricultural purposes, then repurposed to serve as salt evaporation ponds to produce salt for food and other purposes. Today, regulations limit

7670-436: The bay into north and south regions. In 1989, the federal Environmental Protection Agency defined the South Bay as the northern part of Santa Clara County and the southeastern part of San Mateo County. The Bay Area is located in the warm-summer Mediterranean climate zone ( Köppen Csb ) that is a characteristic of California's coast, featuring mild to cool winters with occasional rainfall, and warm to hot, dry summers. It

7788-444: The bay shallows as a refuge, is the most important component of the flyway south of Alaska . Many endangered species of birds are also found here: the California least tern , the California clapper rail , the snowy egret , and the black crowned night heron . There is also a significant diversity of salmonids present in the bay. Steelhead populations in California have dramatically declined due to human and natural causes; in

7906-418: The bay, with uptake in the bay's phytoplankton and contamination of its sportfish . Aquatic mammals are also present in the bay. Before 1825, Spanish, French, English, Russians and Americans were drawn to the Bay Area to harvest prodigious quantities of beaver , river otter , marten, fisher, mink, fox, weasel, harbor and fur seals and sea otter . This early fur trade, known as the California Fur Rush ,

8024-414: The business venture was a financial failure, it was the first semiconductor company in the Bay Area, and the talent that it attracted to the region eventually led to a high-tech cluster of companies later known as Silicon Valley . In 1989, in the middle of a World Series game between two Bay Area baseball teams, the Loma Prieta earthquake struck and caused widespread infrastructural damage, including

8142-437: The city of San Francisco, natural and artificial topographical features direct the movement of wind and fog, resulting in startlingly varied climates between city blocks. Along the Golden Gate Strait , oceanic wind and fog from the Pacific Ocean are able to penetrate the mountain barriers inland into the Bay Area. During the summer, rising hot air in California's interior valleys creates a low pressure area that draws winds from

8260-455: The close of one of the past ice ages, when the Central Valley was a vast inland lake . Melting ice from the Sierra Nevada raised the water level while seismic activity created a new outlet to the Pacific Ocean, draining the lake into the ocean and exposing the valley floors. The strait is named after the Karkin people ( los Carquines in Spanish), a linguistic division of the Ohlone indigenous peoples who once resided on both sides of

8378-494: The country, has five MSAs which include, wholly or partially, areas within the nine-county definition, and one CSA which includes eight Bay Area counties (excluding Sonoma ), but including neighboring San Benito , Santa Cruz , San Joaquin , Merced , and Stanislaus counties. The Association of Bay Area Health Officers (ABAHO), an organization that has fought local outbreaks of HIV/AIDS in 1980s and with COVID-19 pandemic and Delta cron hybrid variant (2020–22), consists of

8496-592: The decision-making process that officially named Army Point as the future dam site. Still more wrangling in the legislature was required before the "Salt Water Barrier" was officially adopted in May 1929, and made part of the state water conservation project. On January 24, 1930, with the Great Depression taking hold, President Herbert Hoover cancelled the Carquinez Strait project, saying that it

8614-490: The destruction of tidal marshes, and large portions are currently being rehabilitated to their natural state. Over time, droughts and wildfires have increased in frequency and become less seasonal and more year-round, further straining the region's water security . According to the 2010 United States Census , the population of the nine-county Bay Area was 7.15 million, with 49.6% male and 50.4% female. Of these, approximately 2.3 million (32%) are foreign born. In 2010

8732-493: The director of a top-secret research project at Harvard University during World War II, joined the faculty at Stanford University in order to reshape the university's engineering department. His students, including David Packard and William Hewlett , would later help usher in the region's high-tech revolution. In 1955, Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory opened for business in Mountain View near Stanford, and although

8850-603: The earliest known archaeological evidence of human habitation of the Bay Area estuaries, dates to around 10,000 BCE, with evidence pointing to even earlier settlement in Point Reyes in Marin County . It has been conjectured that the people living in the Bay Area at the time of first European contact were descended from Siberian tribes who arrived at around 1,000 BCE by sailing over the Arctic Ocean and following

8968-600: The early 1960s, the Bay Area and the rest of Northern California became the center of the counterculture movement . Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley and the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood in San Francisco were seen as centers of activity, with the hit American pop song San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair) further enticing like-minded individuals to join the movement in the Bay Area and leading to

9086-646: The effects of the quake hastened the loss of the region's dominant status in California to the Los Angeles metropolitan area . During the 1929 stock market crash and subsequent economic depression , not a single San Francisco-based bank failed, while the region attempted to spur job growth by simultaneously undertaking two large infrastructure projects: construction of the Golden Gate Bridge , which would connect San Francisco with Marin County , and

9204-571: The end of the Gold Rush, two thirds of the indigenous population had been killed. During this same time, a constitutional convention was called to determine California's application for statehood into the United States. After statehood was granted, the capital city moved between three cities in the Bay Area: San Jose (1849–1851), Vallejo (1851–1852), and Benicia (1852–1853) before permanently settling in Sacramento in 1854. As

9322-594: The failure of the Bay Bridge , a major link between San Francisco and Oakland . Even so, the Bay Area's technology industry continued to expand and growth in Silicon Valley accelerated: the United States census confirmed that year that San Jose had overtaken San Francisco in terms of population. The commercialization of the Internet in the middle of the decade rapidly created a speculative bubble in

9440-589: The first time over Portsmouth Square . In 1848, James W. Marshall 's discovery of gold in the American River sparked the California Gold Rush , and within half a year 4,000 men were panning for gold along the river and finding $ 50,000 per day. The promise of fabulous riches quickly led to a stampede of wealth-seekers descending on Sutter's Mill . The Bay Area's population quickly emptied out as laborers, clerks, waiters, and servants joined

9558-424: The high-tech economy known as the dot-com bubble . This bubble began collapsing in the early 2000s and the industry continued contracting for the next few years, nearly wiping out the market. Companies like Amazon.com and Google managed to weather the crash however, and following the industry's return to normalcy, their market value increased significantly. Even as the growth of the technology sector transformed

9676-454: The incoming moisture at higher altitudes. Winters are mild with moderate rainfall, but summers are very dry and hot. Areas above 2,500 feet (762 m) get light to moderate snow in the winter, especially at the highest point, the 5,241 ft (1,597 m) San Benito Mountain in the remote southeastern section of the range. However, though sites at the lower end get annual snowfall, it is typically light and melts too fast to be noticed. Once or twice

9794-523: The interior, causing a cooling effect for cities along the Peninsula and even as far south as San Jose. This weather pattern is also the source for delays at San Francisco International Airport . In Marin county north of the Golden Gate strait, two gaps north of Muir Woods bring cold air across the Marin Headlands , with the cooling effect reaching as far north as Santa Rosa . Further inland,

9912-408: The larger subregions, the East Bay includes a variety of enclaves, including the suburban Tri-Valley area and the highly urban western part of the subregion that runs alongside the bay, including Oakland. The " North Bay " includes Marin , Sonoma , Napa , and Solano counties, and is the geographically largest and least populated subregion. The western counties of Marin and Sonoma are encased by

10030-512: The largest blue oak growing in Alameda County. There are also good populations of California buckeye ( Aesculus californica ), and California black oak ( Quercus kelloggii ). The gray pine ( Pinus sabiniana ) and rarer Coulter pine ( Pinus coulteri ) can be found at all elevations, especially between 800–3,000 feet (240–910 m). Coulter pine reaches its northern limit on northern of Mt. Diablo. The conifers at higher elevations in

10148-492: The latter two into the Pacific Ocean. In the South Bay, the Guadalupe River drains into San Francisco Bay near Alviso . There are also several lakes present in the Bay Area, including man-made lakes like Lake Berryessa and natural albeit heavily modified lakes like Lake Merritt . Prior to the introduction of European agricultural methods, the shores of San Francisco Bay consisted mostly of tidal marshes. Today,

10266-699: The northwest by the Santa Clara Valley and San Francisco Bay . On USGS maps, the "Diablo Range" is shown as the ridgeline which runs between its namesake Mount Diablo southeastward past Mount Hamilton . However, the USGS Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) includes the East Bay Hills in its list of various GPS coordinates for the Diablo Range. Although not formally recognized by USGS GNIS,

10384-411: The northwesternmost extremity of Kern County . Though the average elevation is about 3,000 feet (910 meters), a summit of over 2,300 feet (700 m) is considered high, mainly because the range is mostly rolling grassland and plateaus, punctuated by isolated peaks. Plateaus are usually at about 2,000–3,000 feet (610–910 m). Hills rise to about 1,000 feet (300 m), while foothills such those in

10502-524: The ocean through a valley near present-day Monterey. However, ongoing seismic activity raised the coastal mountains sufficiently to plug this outlet. Concurrently, ice melting off the Sierras raised the water level in Lake Corcoran until the lake began to carve a new outlet to the ocean. At some point, the coastal barrier collapsed between today's cities of Crockett and Benicia, releasing lake water in

10620-670: The ocean was wasteful. While many solutions were proposed, few appeared practical. A political consensus formed that damming the Carquinez Strait should solve the seawater intrusion problem. In September 1923, the California Legislature appropriated $ 10,000 (equivalent to $ 179,000 today) for a saltwater dam survey. The Federal government added a $ 20,000 contribution ($ 358,000 today) through the US Reclamation Service. Under Reclamation Service rules, another $ 10,000 needed to be raised from local supporters of

10738-438: The project. The necessary money was raised by March 1924, and the first of three site surveys was announced. The first survey was at Army Point, near Benicia, which was the preferred site based on preliminary studies. The second choice was Dillon Point , near Southampton Bay, while the third survey was at Point San Pablo , near Richmond. The three surveys were completed by the end of 1924. However, it took four years to complete

10856-626: The public health officers of 9 Bay Area counties, in addition to the Central Coast counties of Santa Cruz , San Benito , and Monterey and the city of Berkeley . Among locals, the nine-county Bay Area is divided into five sub-regions: the East Bay , North Bay , Peninsula , city of San Francisco , and South Bay . The " East Bay " is the densest region of the Bay Area outside of San Francisco and includes cities and towns in Alameda and Contra Costa counties centered around Oakland . As one of

10974-497: The racial makeup of the nine-county Bay Area was 52.5% White (42.4% were non-Hispanic and 10.1% were Hispanic ), 23.3% Asian , 6.7% non-Hispanic Black or African American , 0.7% Native American or Alaska Native , 0.6% Pacific Islander , 5.4% from two or more races and 10.8% from other races. Hispanic or Latino residents of any race formed 23.5% of the population. The Bay Area cities of Vallejo , Suisun City , Oakland , San Leandro , Fairfield , and Richmond are among

11092-540: The range south of Gilroy include: Salinas , King City , and Paso Robles . Most of the range consists of private ranchland, limiting recreational use. However, the range does contain several areas of parkland, including Mount Diablo State Park , Alum Rock Park , Grant Ranch Park , Henry W. Coe State Park , Laguna Mountain Recreation Area , and the BLM 's Clear Creek Management Area. In addition, some private land

11210-682: The range. The Diablo Range is paralleled for much of its distance by U.S. Route 101 to the west and by I-5 to the east. Major routes of travel through the range include: A sparsely used gravel road is the highest road in the range, with its highest point being on San Benito Mountain at over 5,000 feet. The Diablo Range is largely unpopulated outside of the San Francisco Bay Area . Major nearby communities include, Antioch , Pittsburg , Concord , Walnut Creek , Alamo , Danville , San Ramon , Pleasanton , Livermore , Fremont , Milpitas , San Jose , Morgan Hill , and Gilroy and

11328-525: The region and even riots in Oakland. His name was symbolically tied to the Occupy Oakland protests two years later that sought to fight against social and economic inequality. By August 2023, San Francisco was in such severe decline that Mayor Matt Mahan of San Jose joked that one day the region might be renamed the "San Jose Bay Area", after its largest and most prosperous city. The borders of

11446-465: The region for Queen Elizabeth I as Nova Albion or New Albion , the English made no immediate follow up to the claim. In 1595, Philip II of Spain tasked Sebastião Rodrigues Soromenho with mapping the west coast of the Americas. Soromenho set sail on Manila Galleon San Agustin on July 5, 1595 and in early November they reached land between Point St. George and Trinidad Head , north of

11564-505: The region's economy, progressive politics continued to guide the region's political environment. By the turn of the millennium, non-Hispanic whites , the largest ethnic group in the United States, were only half of the population in the Bay Area as immigration among minority groups accelerated. During this time, the Bay Area was the center of the LGBT rights movement : in 2004, San Francisco began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples ,

11682-437: The result of millions of years of tectonic plate movements. Because the Bay Area is crossed by six major earthquake faults , the region is particularly exposed to hazards presented by large earthquakes. The climate is temperate and conducive to outdoor recreational and athletic activities such as hiking, running, and cycling. The Bay Area is host to five professional sports teams and is a cultural center for music, theater, and

11800-405: The rush to find gold, and California's first newspaper, The Californian , was forced to announce a temporary freeze in new issues due to labor shortages. By the end of 1849, news had spread across the world and newcomers flooded into the Bay Area at a rate of one thousand per week on their way to California's interior, including the first large influx of Chinese immigrants to the U.S. The rush

11918-531: The salmon migration. However the current academic consensus is compatible with the oral tradition of the Ohlone and Miwok peoples, which suggests they have been living in the Bay Area for several hundreds if not thousands of years. At the time of colonization, the Ohlone peoples in the Bay Area primarily lived on the San Francisco Peninsula, in the South Bay and in the East Bay, and the Miwok primarily lived in

12036-627: The sea water contained in the San Francisco Bay. By the early 20th century, farmers in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta , who depended on irrigating their fields with fresh water from the two rivers noticed an increase in salinity farther inland than before. It became obvious that fresh water was being pumped out of the Delta faster than it could be replenished by rain and snow during the wet season. Farmers, businessmen and politicians complained that allowing fresh water to flow to

12154-543: The strait. Andrei Sarna-Wojcicki, a geologist emeritus of the US Geological Survey (USGS), estimates that the Carquinez Strait was likely formed about 640,000 to 700,000 years ago, while much of modern California was emerging from an ice age . The present Sacramento Valley and San Joaquin Valley were covered by a huge lake (now extinct), which has been called Lake Corcoran . Initially, this lake drained into

12272-544: The strait. State Route 4 connects these highways south of and inland from the strait. A rail bridge just east of the Benicia–Martinez Bridge is used by the Capitol Corridor , California Zephyr , and Coast Starlight trains. A rail ferry , with the ferries Contra Costa and Solano provided service across the strait from 1878 near the location of the current rail bridge until the rail bridge

12390-664: The territory would be short-lived, however, and in 1846 a party of settlers occupied Sonoma Plaza and proclaimed the independence of the new Republic of California . That same year, the Mexican–American War began, and American captain John Berrien Montgomery sailed the USS ; Portsmouth into the bay and seized San Francisco, which was then known as Yerba Buena , and raised the American flag for

12508-537: The tip of the San Francisco Peninsula, the city of San Francisco is not considered part of the "Peninsula" subregion, but as a separate entity. The term "South Bay" has different meanings to different groups: Writing in 1959 for the Army Corps of Engineers , the United States Department of Commerce defined the South Bay as comprising five counties, corresponding to their two-way division of

12626-544: The titular city of San Francisco. Its eastern half, which runs alongside the Bay, is highly populated, while its less populated western coast traces the coastline of the Pacific Ocean and is known for its open space and hiking trails. Roughly coinciding with the borders of San Mateo County , it also includes the northwestern Santa Clara County cities of Palo Alto , Mountain View , and Los Altos . Although geographically located on

12744-735: The way downstream to the San Francisco Bay. Silver and San Carlos creeks provide a wetland environment in an otherwise arid region and are important for the ecology of the region. As of 2011, New Idria has been listed as a Superfund site and scheduled for cleanup. The Diablo Range is part of the California interior chaparral and woodlands ecoregion . It is covered mostly by chaparral and California oak woodland communities, with stands of closed-cone pine forests appearing above 4,000 feet (1,219 m). The native bunch grass savanna has been predominantly replaced by annual Mediterranean grasses , except in some rare habitat fragments. The understory

12862-419: The western counties in the Bay Area, leaving only Alameda , Contra Costa , and Solano counties as remnants of a once large breeding range. Bald eagles were once common in the Bay Area, but habitat destruction and thinning of eggs from DDT poisoning reduced the California state population to 35 nesting pairs. Bald eagles disappeared from the Bay Area in 1915, and only began returning in recent years. In

12980-415: The western slopes include Alameda Creek and Coyote Creek . The Diablo Range's peaks and ridges are between 2,517–5,241 feet (767–1,597 m) and are distinct landmarks. Mount Diablo (3,849 feet (1,173 m)), San Benito Mountain (5,241 feet (1,597 m)), Mount Hamilton Ridge (4,230–4,260 feet (1,290–1,300 m)), and Mount Stakes (3,804 feet (1,159 m)) are four of the highest peaks in

13098-459: The winter season is cool and mild, the summer season is characterized by warm sunny days, while in San Francisco and areas closer to the Golden Gate strait, the summer season is periodically affected by fog. Due to the Bay Area's diverse topographic relief (itself the result of the clashing tectonic plates ), the region is home to numerous microclimates that lead to pronounced differences in climate and temperature over short distances. Within

13216-624: Was built in 1930. Tall pylons carrying power lines cross the strait as well. The Carquinez Strait Powerline Crossing was the world's first powerline crossing of a large river. The channel is navigable and is used for commercial and military shipping. Deep water ship traffic bound for both the Port of Sacramento and the Port of Stockton traverse the strait through the Stockton Deepwater Shipping Channel and Sacramento Deep Water Ship Channel . Carquinez Strait

13334-598: Was first reported in Redwood Creek at Muir Beach in 1996, has since been spotted in the North Bay's Corte Madera Creek , the South Bay's Coyote Creek , as well as in 2010 in San Francisco Bay itself at the Richmond Marina . Other mammals include the internationally famous sea lions who began inhabiting San Francisco's Pier 39 after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and the locally famous Humphrey

13452-650: Was instrumental in loaning out funds for rebuilding efforts. Congress immediately approved plans for a reservoir in Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park , a plan they had denied a few years earlier, which now provides drinking water for 2.4 million people in the Bay Area. By 1915, the city had been sufficiently rebuilt and advertised itself to the world during the Panama Pacific Exposition that year, although

13570-616: Was more than any other single factor, responsible for opening up the West and the San Francisco Bay Area, in particular, to world trade. By 1817 sea otter in the area were practically eliminated. Since then, the California golden beaver re-established a presence in Alhambra Creek , followed by the Napa River and Sonoma Creek in the north, and the Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek in the south. The North American river otter which

13688-574: Was of Asian origin. The completion of the railroad connected the Bay Area with the rest of the United States, established a truly national marketplace for the trade of goods, and accelerated the urbanization of the region. In the early morning of April 18, 1906, a large earthquake with an epicenter near the city of San Francisco hit the region. Immediate casualty estimates by the U.S. Army 's relief operations were 498 deaths in San Francisco, 64 deaths in Santa Rosa , and 102 in or near San Jose, for

13806-413: Was so great that vessels were abandoned by the hundreds in San Francisco's ports as crews rushed to the goldfields. The unprecedented influx of new arrivals spread the nascent government authorities thin, and the military was unable to prevent desertions. As a result, numerous vigilante groups formed to provide order, but many tasked themselves with forcibly moving or killing local Native Americans , and by

13924-631: Was too costly. All efforts to revive the project failed. Years later, the Central Valley Project attempted to mitigate the effects of seawater intrusion by constructing other dams much farther inland and canals to send fresh water to the San Joaquin Valley. San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area , commonly known as the Bay Area , is a region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay . The Association of Bay Area Governments defines

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