McKinleyville Community Forest

Escrow closed on February 2, 2024. That's when 599 acres along McKinleyville's eastern edge became a community forest, ending a project that took eleven years to land.

It started as an objective in the district's 2013 strategic plan. MCSD partnered with the Trust for Public Land in 2015, and on December 9, 2020 the California Natural Resources Agency put up a $3.8 million grant. The North Coast Journal reported that MCSD became the first special district in California to hold title to a community forest.

Access is simple. The forest sits south of Murray Road, running east of town toward Hunts Drive. One gated parking lot is marked as the trailhead on the official map, open sunrise to sunset.

Trails are a work in progress and MCSD doesn't publish a total mileage. The August 2024 map labels individual segments ranging from 0.1 to 0.9 miles. A revised segment map came out in 2025, and there's an interactive ArcGIS map plus a trail user reporting form. Volunteers build trail on the third Saturday of each month.

What's growing is second- and third-growth Sitka spruce, redwood and Douglas fir, with riparian corridors along Widow White Creek and Mill Creek. Roughly a third of the trees are 20 years old or younger, which is why the North Coast Journal reported that self-supporting timber harvest here is decades away. Three things are prohibited on the official map: camping, fires and motorized vehicles.

Everything else is unwritten. MCSD publishes no dog policy, no leash rule and no explicit bike or horse rule for this forest. The district partners with the Redwood Coast Mountain Bike Association, the Mountain Bike Tribal Trail Alliance, the Humboldt Trails Council and the Redwood Empire Endurance Riders, which tells you who's using the place. It doesn't tell you the rules.