Millbrae's Bayfront Park (SFO Mudflats) Description & Information

Millbrae's Bayfront Park (SFO Mudflats)

Spring Summer Fall Winter

Marshy Area at Bayfront Park, Millbrae, looking north (Jennifer Rycenga)

Description

Area Habitats
Mud Flats, Bay, Suburban/Urban

Print Page
without images

Say you are a visiting business traveler, and a birder. Your company booked you into the closest hotel they could find to the airport (SFO). There you are, at the Westin, Marriot or Clarion in Millbrae, surrounded, it seems, by the urban sprawl of a major international airport, a BART and CalTrain station, and a major highway (US101). Don't despair! The bay is right there! There's a park provided for your viewing pleasure! Complete with extensive mudflats! You'll see some birds now, for sure! The shorebirds here can include a wide assortment, gulls are plentiful, and waterfowl can be scoped out. Passerines, though, are few.

The city of Millbrae's description of this postage-stamp-sized park summarizes its function succinctly "If you enjoy watching airplanes then you will enjoy this recreational area." If you have the time to visit Coyote Point, Radio Road in Redwood Shores, or Bedwell Bayfront Park, you shouldn't prioritize this spot. But Millbrae's mudflats are so underbirded that you've got a fine chance of turning up a rarity, or getting a great close-up of a shorebird as it molts into alternate plumage. So this park is worth a quick stop (one especially good reason for locals to consider it is that it makes a perfect diversion if a friend's plane is running late. Watching birds here would certainly be more ecologically healthy than driving around the airport for an hour or more). If you are a visitor, a brief walk in this park will orient you to the mid-bayshore region: just to the northwest of the airport, you will see the looming beauty of San Bruno Mountain, and to the southeast of the park, you can see the tree-filled peninsula that is Coyote Point Regional Park. You will understand at once why this latter location is the best migrant hotspot along the bayshore. The long San Mateo Bridge rises south beyond Coyote Point. Next time you fly into SFO, your geographic knowledge will impress your seat mates!

Once you have parked at the free spaces contiguous to the Marriot Hotel lot (there are a few overflow spaces in the Westin lot, too), you can choose to walk across the small bridge to the north. This leads you closer to the airport, and to some marshy grass that could potentially hold interesting migrants or rails. If you walk south, your pathway borders the Marriot hotel, and crosses into Burlingame. Either vantage will allow you to see extensive mudflats at low tide, and open bay waters beyond.

This is an ideal park for birding with children, or with people who have mobility issues; the entire bayfront path is paved, and children of all ages will enjoy the constant activity of planes of all sizes at San Francisco International Airport (SFO). It is an easy and level walk throughout, except for the foot bridge at the start. Despite the proximity of both the airport and the street, the path is surprisingly not too noisy, especially walking south along the back of the Marriot. Wind is more likely to be a problem than noise most days.

Birds to expect (mostly fall-spring) include Clark's and Western Grebes, American Wigeon, Greater and Lesser Scaups, Bufflehead, Willet, Black-bellied and Semi-palmated Plovers, Marbled Godwit, Long-billed Curlew, Long-billed and Short-billed Dowitchers, Least and Western Sandpipers, Western, Glaucous-winged, Ring-billed, and California Gulls, Rock Pigeon, Black Phoebe, European Starling, Bushtit, and House Sparrow. Birding is better here from fall-spring; summer can be rather quiet due to the absence of shorebirds.

Look For These Birds

Canada Goose, Gadwall, Mallard, American Wigeon, Northern Shoveler, Northern Pintail, Green-winged Teal, Canvasback, Greater Scaup, Lesser Scaup, Surf Scoter, Bufflehead, Common Goldeneye, Ruddy Duck, Pied-billed Grebe, Eared Grebe, Horned Grebe, Western Grebe, Clark's Grebe, Brown Pelican, Double-crested Cormorant, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, Great Blue Heron, Turkey Vulture, Osprey, White-tailed Kite, Northern Harrier, Red-shouldered Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, Ridgway's Rail, Virginia Rail, Sora, American Coot, Semipalmated Plover, Black-bellied Plover, Killdeer, American Avocet, Black-necked Stilt, Greater Yellowlegs, Willet, Lesser Yellowlegs, Whimbrel, Long-billed Curlew, Marbled Godwit, Sanderling, Western Sandpiper, Least Sandpiper, Dunlin, Ruddy Turnstone, Long-billed Dowitcher, Short-billed Dowitcher, Wilson's Phalarope, Red-necked Phalarope, Short-billed Gull, Western Gull, Herring Gull, Glaucous-winged Gull, Ring-billed Gull, California Gull, Forster's Tern, Rock Pigeon, Mourning Dove, Anna's Hummingbird, Black Phoebe, American Crow, Cliff Swallow, Barn Swallow, Chestnut-backed Chickadee, Bushtit, Marsh Wren, American Robin, Northern Mockingbird, European Starling, American Pipit, Common Yellowthroat, Yellow-rumped Warbler, White-crowned Sparrow, Golden-crowned Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Dark-eyed Junco, Brewer's Blackbird, Brown-headed Cowbird, Red-winged Blackbird, House Finch, Lesser Goldfinch, House Sparrow

Rarities Seen Here

In this guide, "rarities" are defined as those species given an County Abundance Code of 4, 5, or 6.
Pacific Golden-Plover, Thayer's Gull

Directions

The park is located at the corner of Millbrae and Old Bayshore. Take US 101 to the Millbrae exit, and go east. Where Millbrae ends, turn right onto Bayshore. Take your next available left (a turn lane is provided) into the Marriot Hotel's parking lot, and bear left. There are a handful of spaces here set aside for Bayfront Park. There are a handful of overflow spaces in the Westin lot, which is the first right off of Bayshore after you turn off of Millbrae. It is also very easy to get to this park from the airport (take the Clarion/Westin, or the Marriot shuttle), or from the Millbrae BART/CalTrain station.

Interactive Map

Red Markers: Parking Area or Trail Head
Hover mouse pointer over marker, or click marker, for pin identification.
Use + or - buttons to change map zoom. Click & Drag to pan.

Fees

Use of the park is free.

Hours

There is no official curfew for the park.

Hazards

Traffic is your major hazard here: be careful if crossing the street. People drive very quickly in this area, and really zip around the corner of Millbrae and Bayshore. Other than that, this is a fairly safe location, with few natural or human-made hazards. Because of the large hotels in the area, plenty of people are milling about at all hours. The free parking provided by both the Marriot and the Westin has to be a modern miracle in a neighborhood where $10/day airport parking is considered a bargain! So please observe the time limits on the free parking (generally two hours).

Facilities

While there are no facilities, per se, in the park, all of the hotels here have lobbies and restaurants that will have restrooms for emergencies (provided you don't look like you've spent all morning raking through the mud of a salt marsh). There is a Starbuck's in the lobby of the Marriot, and plentiful food and provisions throughout Millbrae and Burlingame.

Accessibility

Accessibility information is currently not available for this location.

Contact

There is no official contact information for this park. Contact the City of Millbrae for additional information.

Links

City of Millbrae Description of Bayfront Park
Bayfront Park is part of the Bay Trail
The Importance of Bayfront Park to Plane Spotters is highlighted in this Spotters Guide to SFO
The San Francisco Bay Trail is described in its entirety here.
A pdf map of the Bay Trail from San Francisco to Foster City.
Ron Horii's Bay Trail pages are the most informative
SFGate (the web equivalent of the San Francisco Chronicle) has a guide to the Bay Trail, accessible here.
Save The Bay's Top 10 Trash Sites has a slide show on the depressing aspects of garbage in the Colma Creek Mouth area.
To help in removing that garbage, go to the home page of Save The Bay
In 2009, the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory (SFBBO) started a series of field trips to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the Bay Trail. Watch their website for upcoming events.
Invasive Spartina (cordgrass) threatens the health of much of the bayshore in San Mateo, particularly having deleterious effects on Clapper Rail. The San Francisco Estuary Invasive Spartina Project is a coordinated effort for educating the public about the problem and combating this aggressive invasive plant. Their very detailed pdf map highlights problems at Colma Creek Mouth.

Avian Research Status

Millbrae's Bayfront Park is now a hotspot in eBird, with the name "Bayfront Park - Millbrae (SM Co.)" with thirteen time quadrants of forty-eight featuring 79 species. Help fill out this relatively new eBird hotspot by sharing your sightings with science and future generations: participate in eBird
The San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory (SFBBO) is conducting a long-range study of gull movements in the Bay Area. California Gulls have been leg-banded with plastic colored bands. If you see any of these gulls, please note the leg and the color of the band; if it is possible to read the number on the band, record that also. This information can be shared directly with Carly at SFBBO (cschacter@sfbbo.org). If the birds also have a metal band, and you can read that number, too, please report that to the National Bird Banding Lab.

Sequoia Audubon Society led a field trip to this location in 1958. For many decades it was ignored until the importance of the Ridgway's Rail at this location resulted in four field trips here in the late 2010s.