Alviso salt ponds and South Bay Salt Pond Restoration within San Jose

The former industrial salt evaporation ponds in the Alviso area of northern San Jose form an extensive anthropogenic landscape along the south San Francisco Bay and are a core area of the South Bay Salt Pond Restoration Project. Large areas of these ponds and adjacent tidal marshes sit at or below historic sea level and have experienced subsidence from past reclamation and peat oxidation, creating unique elevation anomalies relative to surrounding uplands. Restoration and levee-breach work in Alviso have intentionally reintroduced tidal channels to low-lying former salt ponds to restore wetlands and change local tidal hydraulics. The refuge and restoration area provide habitat for migratory birds and document human alteration of bay-edge elevations.