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Acacia Steps (Path #24)

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Meet The Paths:
Acacia Steps by Sandy Friedland
Berkeley Path Wanderers Association Newsletter -- Winter 2005 -- Vol. 8 No. 4

With rustic stepping stones at its top and irises, daisies, and a rainbow of cineraria along its borders, Acacia Steps is among Berkeley’s loveliest paths. It is also a model of how neighbors, civic groups, and BPWA can collaborate to maintain our treasured walkways.

Linking Spruce Street and Cragmont Avenue high in northeast Berkeley, Acacia Steps is one of ten paths added to the new edition of the BPWA map. All were considered unsafe until city engineers and volunteers improved them. Last spring an Eagle Scout project along with BPWA path builders added 41 steps to the treacherous lower section.

Now the path is a favorite of families going to and from nearby Dorothy Bolte Park and First Step preschool and of commuters who catch the #67 bus on Spruce. The bottom lies between the storybook- style, half-timbered houses at 537 and 543 Spruce. They are thought to be the work of Oakland architect Walter W. Dixon. On Cragmont, the path begins between #’s 598 and 600.

Long before the recent improvements, neighbors had shared their irrigation systems and gardening skills to beautify the path. The late physicist Harvey White, first director of Lawrence Hall of Science, lived at 543 Spruce and installed the stepping stones.

Neighbors are enthusiastic about the improvements to Acacia Steps. Eugenie Bruck, of 600 Cragmont, calls the path a “social center.” “It is so much more accessible now, and everyone just loves it,” she says. “ I meet the nicest people I wouldn’t have gotten to know otherwise.”