Robert Doyle is a veteran of the parks and open space field with a career spanning 35 plus years. He currently serves as General Manager of the East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD) in the San Francisco Bay area which is the largest local park district in the United States serving a diverse population of users in an urban interface setting, with 15 million visitors per year to its 65 parks and 1,200 miles of trails on 113,000 acres of open space.
Doyle is a founding member of Save Mount Diablo, a nonprofit land trust and conservation organization that serves to save lands from development and add acreage to the California State Park Mount Diablo, one of the Ecological Treasures of the San Francisco Bay Area. As Board president, he led the growth of the organization from 1,000 to 5,000 members. He has also served as a board member of the Bay Area Open Space Council, as a founding board member of the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council, and was appointed to the first Board of Directors of the Agricultural-Natural Resources Trust of Contra Costa County. He has received industry recognition including a Mountain Star Award from Save Mount Diablo (2002) and a Lifetime Achievement Award from California Trails and Greenways (2010).
He began his career as a park ranger, serving at diverse parks within EBRPD and moving to the administrative side first working in Planning & Design Department and then on trails in the Land Department, later becoming a Chief and then Assistant General Manager in 1990, where he served for 21 years. Mr. Doyle’s achievements at the Park District include co-authoring expenditure plans for both the $500 million Bond Measure WW Extension approved by voters in 2008, and the earlier Measure AA approved in 1988. He developed the master plan for the Park District’s nationally recognized multi-use urban trail system, which received a $10.2 million U.S. Department of Transportation Grant in 2010. Mr. Doyle was also the lead negotiator for a partnership with the East Contra Costa County Habitat Conservancy that has resulted in thousands of acres of preserved open space in eastern Contra Costa County.
He attended Diablo Valley College and San Francisco State University, as well as completing continuing education courses at University of California at Davis, the International Right of Way Association, and the National Park and Recreation Association. He graduated from Saint Mary’s College with a BA in Management and is a black belt in Aikido. Doyle is a resident of Walnut Creek and was born and raised in Contra Costa County. [current as of 10/13]