Due to the decision by the Oregon State Park Service to close all state parks as of today I have decided to make a series of maps that highlight the state parks that Portlandites most visit.
The first in this series is a map of Oregon state parks that are within a 50 mile radius of Portland, park boundaries are highlighted in red and have an associtated identification number, use this number with the attatched reference table to find the name of the State Park. State park data layer is sourced from the 2014 State Park Boundary layer from the Oregon Geospatial Library, basemap, features, and final map design were created using QGIS 3.10.
State Parks were closed as of today in response to the outbreaks of CORVID - 19 in Oregon in an effort to maintain social distancing practices that are in accordance with the CDC. Parks will be closed at least till May 8th, any cancelled reservations will be refunded.
If you're bummed by the closures of the parks, and were looking forward to heading outside to get you through the COVID-19 crisis, then you're not alone. Many of us were looking forward to escaping into the outdoors to forget our concerns in this trying time, but therein lies the problem. State parks were closed due to concerns that too many people were congregating on beaches and campgrounds which may have had a severly negative impact of rural health care systems that surround these parks. With an influx of people to these outlying areas, rural hospitals that have limited resources to handle this epidemic would be overwhelmed, the recent closure is about supporting these small and vulnerable communities, not about preventing you from going outside.
So what do you do in the mean time while we wait for the parks to open back up?
Heres a statement from the Oregon State Park Webpage.
"Go out if it's important. Take a walk around your neighborhood if that's what you need, where it's easier to avoid clumping up. We don't recommend you travel to any popular recreation hotspot. You might think, "Well, if everyone else stays home, that means I can go."Â ... no, that's not what that means."
Stay safe, stay healthy, and support your community by staying coronavirus free. Wash your hands, avoid touching your face, and try to stay home as much as possible. We can all get through this if we all stick together.
- Charles Ross
Link to the Oregon State Park wepage regarding the recent closures
P.S. Sorry for the quality of the reference table, still working on generating something a bit more clear.
