Golden Gate National Recreation Area

Golden Gate National Recreation Area
IUCN category V (protected landscape/seascape)
View of the Golden Gate from Lands End
Golden Gate NRA Show map of California Golden Gate NRA Show map of the United States
Location	San Francisco Bay Area, California, United States
Nearest city	San Francisco, California
Coordinates	37°48′N 122°29′W / 37.80°N 122.48°W / 37.80; -122.48
Area	82,116 acres (332.31 km2)[1]
Established	October 27, 1972
Visitors	14,953,882 (in 2023)[2]
Governing body	National Park Service
Website	nps.gov/goga

The Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA) is a U.S. National Recreation Area protecting 82,116 acres (33,231 ha) of ecologically and historically significant landscapes surrounding the San Francisco Bay Area. Much of the park is land formerly used by the United States Army. GGNRA is managed by the National Park Service and is the second-most visited unit of the National Park system in the United States (ranking only under Blue Ridge Parkway), with more than 15.6 million visitors in 2022. It is also one of the largest urban parks in the world, with a size two-and-a-half times that of the consolidated city and county of San Francisco.

The park is not one continuous locale but rather a collection of areas that stretch from southern San Mateo County to northern Marin County and includes several areas of San Francisco. The park is as diverse as it is expansive; it contains famous tourist attractions such as Muir Woods National Monument, Alcatraz, and the Presidio of San Francisco. The GGNRA is also home to over 3,000 plant and animal species,^[3] encompasses 59 miles (95 km) of bay and ocean shoreline and has military fortifications that span centuries of California history, from the Spanish conquistadors to Cold War-era Nike missile sites.