West Seattle, Washington
07 Thursday
The Times has a big article today about biodiesel with a citywide map purporting to show where it’s available – including two spots on the eastern edge of West Seattle — but that map omits two more-centrally located spots in WS where we know biodiesel to be available (though sadly we don’t have a car capable of using it): The Admiral Safeway service station (as first mentioned in February) and Hans VW (35th/Graham). Anywhere else?
The new Seattle CAN (Climate Action Now) campaign asks us all to take a few simple steps, such as using energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulbs. You can get one free today by going to any of the following:
–The WS kickoff event for Seattle CAN featuring Hizzoner, KC Councilmember Dow C, Sustainable West Seattle, Delridge Neighborhoods Development Association, the Delridge councils, Chief Sealth HS, performers, and a lot more, at Youngstown Arts Center, 9 am-1 pm (info provided by SWS includes notes about refreshments @ 9, the mayor speaking @ 9:30, and a biodiesel demo @ 9:45)
–Public libraries around the city, including the four here in WS (Delridge, High Point, Southwest, West Seattle, all open 10-6 today according to those branch websites) – 1 PM UPDATE, we just stopped by the WS branch to get one, and the people manning the Seattle CAN table there told us they are there until 4.
Four clips from today’s event: First, the kids — from Gatewood Elementary, Denny Middle, and Chief Sealth HS, with EarthCorps assistants:
Here’s Nobel Peace Prize recipient Wangari Maathai assisting with one of the trees — this is what she’s famous for, if you aren’t familiar with her work; this online reference calls her the “Tree Woman of Kenya”:
Also at Pelly Place: King County Councilmember Dow Constantine. Our videographer asked him for a few words, and he reminded us he’s no stranger to ravine restoration:
Last but by no means least, part of the poetry performance by Gatewood Elementary students:
The WSB photo/video crew is just back from the tree planting at Pelly Place held today in connection with Earth Summit II at Chief Sealth HS. First photo shows Nobel Peace Prize recipient Wangari Maathai assisting students with the tree planting:
The photo below shows Gatewood Elementary students who read a poem at the event. Others in attendance included King County Councilmember Dow Constantine; no mayor sightings — he is in Eastern Washington today. We will post video from the Pelly Place event later.
TOMORROW NIGHT: What should the city do with millions of your $ earmarked for transportation projects? Don’t wait till you read here that crews are on their way to (fill in the blank) and then say “Hey! Why don’t they (whatever) instead?” — stop by tomorrow night’s city Transportation Department open house at Youngstown Arts Center between 5 and 8 pm, look at what’s under consideration, register your preference. Or – if you absolutely can’t make it in person – the city has set up a webpage where you can see what’s on the potential project list and rank your preferences – click here, then choose South Sector; with 29 WS locations on the list, one just might be near you. Make your choices by September 27th.
ALL DAY TOMORROW: Chief Sealth HS hosts Seattle Earth Summit II 9:30 am-3 pm with an impressive guest list, including the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Wangari Maathai, as well as West Seattle’s world-famous photographer Art Wolfe. Also part of the agenda: a ceremonial tree-planting @ 11:30 am at Pelly Place Ravine, which Wolfe and local students are working together to revitalize as part of Project Earth Care.
A comprehensive update at Fauntleroy.net tells the tale of the Fauntleroy Creek “Reach to the Beach” project, all finished except revegetation, just south of the ferry dock …
Next step: Awaiting the salmon. According to the Fauntleroy.net writeup, some coho already have been seen off Lincoln Park, so they “are optimistic watchers will have fish to watch” when the annual Salmon Watch begins along Fauntleroy Creek next month. Sign-ups for volunteers are under way now; scroll to the bottom of this Fauntleroy.net page for contact information, and also mark your calendar for 5 pm Sunday, October 21st, when the community will gather at the creek’s fish-ladder viewpoint for drumming to call the salmon home.
We keep trying to catch up with the Seal Sitters who have been keeping watch for weeks to protect the baby harbor seals that turn up to take a break on the beach at Alki. Almost connected after hearing about their 1 pm picnic on Sunday — then rain forced them indoors — but at least our videographer found one of the seals. Adorability awaits:
One WSB reader asked us if the Seal Sitters are on duty 24 hours a day. Seal-sitter organizer Brenda Peterson says they’ve been trying their best to cover most of the clock, as volunteer availability allows. (If you’re interested in volunteering, e-mail us and we’ll forward her your contact info.) Wondering why Seal Sitters are needed? Here’s just one anecdote underscoring the need. You can read more about harbor seals and the laws protecting them here.
Just four months into its hopefully long lifespan, Sustainable West Seattle continues to grow. Tomorrow night, you’re invited to its next meeting — 7 pm, Camp Long, family-friendly, so kids are welcome — where county and city reps will talk about transportation and climate-change issues, respectively. The latter is of special note, with a Seattle CAN (Climate Action Now) kickoff event in WS next Saturday. (Here’s a new reason to care about climate change.) If you can’t make tomorrow’s meeting, see the Sustainable WS website, which includes contact info for the people running its action groups (Energy, Transportation, Food & Health, Water & Waste Reduction, Green Building & Planning).
On Thursday night, while the Alki Statue of Liberty meeting was under way at the Bathhouse, a SW Design Review Board meeting was under way at the Precinct, and several WS schools had events — a quiet but important demonstration was under way in West Seattle waters: Members of the Surfrider Foundation, People for Puget Sound, and others paddled out from Seacrest to remind us all that the state needs a better oil-spill prevention plan, specifically one that protects the ultimate gateway to Puget Sound — the Strait of Juan de Fuca — with a year-round rescue tug @ Neah Bay. Since we knew we’d be otherwise occupied, we asked the Surfrider folks to send pix; here’s one from water level (the banner has the SF name & logo).
Right now, rescue tugs are only stationed at the state’s northwestern tip for the winter. (The next one is scheduled to be in place October 1st-March 15th. That time frame wouldn’t have covered the disastrous Tenyo Maru incident in July 1991, which as this link reminds us took 15 years to recover from.) Here’s more on where the push for a year-round tug stands now.
The monthly West Seattle Art Walk in The Junction is 6-9 pm tonight; organizers have posted the flyer (with map and list of participating businesses, buildings, and artists) online here. The folks at Ginomai also wrote us to make sure you know they have a “great free parking lot” at their place on the north end of the Art Walk route (42nd/Genesee); for this month’s Art Walk, they are featuring five artists from the Senior Center in the Ginomai community room.
Also tonight — from the WS waterfront, you might notice a big contingent of paddlers heading out from Alki Kayak Tours at Seacrest around 6:30. The Surfrider Foundation, People for Puget Sound, and others are heading out in kayaks and on boards to call attention to their push for federal $ for what they say is a necessary component of oil-spill prevention in Puget Sound — a full-time rescue tug stationed at Neah Bay, to cover the entrance to the Strait of Juan de Fuca. (The WS waters we enjoy here, ultimately come from there. A near-catastrophe happened there in 1991 and can happen again.)
Warning for Fairmount Playfield users: The city plans to use herbicide there next week to stamp out an infestation of Japanese knotweed. This is somewhat noteworthy because it’s a pesticide-free park; the city says there’s no way around having to poison the knotweed. Having seen the city’s photo (right), we believe these are the plants we only half-jokingly refer to each summer, upon sight of them in public places, as “the triffids.”
Just south of the ferry dock, work has begun in earnest on a project Fauntleroy Creek stewards call “the reach to the beach.” Over the next 2 weeks, with the help of EarthCorps, they are working to transform the last stretch of FC into something more natural. Judy Pickens tells us major work won’t start till tomorrow, but we noticed a definite difference between the view of the beach this afternoon (first photo below) and yesterday (second photo below):
The coho salmon of Fauntleroy Creek need all the help they can get, after a disappointing year; here’s hoping this project does the trick. By the way, the FC fish ladder on the other side of Fauntleroy Way celebrates its 10th anniversary next year!
Catching up from the weekend, we have another work-party report from one of West Seattle’s treasured greenspaces: Lina Rose from EarthCorps says 10 volunteers joined her and forest steward Kirsten Rohrbach to clear almost 1000 square feet of invasive weeds from the Thistle Street Greenspace along Longfellow Creek, including clearing space around young cedar trees planted along the creek trail. Lina sent photos; first one shows what it looked like before they dug in:
Next, volunteers in the middle of their work:
No “after” photo – you’ll just have to go see for yourself (Thistle Street Greenspace is one of those places we’ll admit is on our “haven’t been there but must go soon” list; it’s easy to find, just off Thistle east of Chief Sealth HS). Next work party there is September 22nd; other Longfellow Creek sites have monthly work parties, listed here (and also always included in our weekly West Seattle Weekend Lineup posted every Friday morning).
If you share our night-owliness, you may be happy to hear the weather looks promising for tonight’s big (well, technically, tomorrow morning) lunar eclipse. (The height of the excitement, according to NASA, is between 2 and 4 am. You’ll probably see us out looking for the latest-available latte before Ladro closes at 11ish, or is anyone open later?) Since it’s a full moon as well, that brings tidal extremes; we were down by the water for some low-tide sights this morning. First photo, a starfish hugging one of the pilings at Seacrest; second, a NOAA ship passing Alki (with the help of NOAA Ship Tracker, we think it’s Miller Freeman, but aren’t 100% sure thanks to reader Frank @ NOAA for informing us it’s the Okeanus Explorer):
As of October, all PCC stores (WS & 7 others) will discontinue plastic grocery bags.
Our websearch for WS news turned up the following quote in this story from Spokane. We’re scratching our heads because honestly, even with the condos and townhouses, we still think WS is far from a horror story.
“My vision of Spokane Valley is not to look like West Seattle in 30 years,” (Spokane) Councilman Rich Munson said
You suppose we can get our WS-dwelling mayor and councilmember to call him up and tell him to stop dissing us?
Every week in our West Seattle weekend lineup, we include the “work parties” that are set up each month at sites that are among our area’s most precious natural treasures. For example, the Brandon Street Natural Area, which is a section of the Longfellow Creek Legacy Trail, where Jay Mirro leads the monthly events and is hoping to see a few more folks turn out today. He writes:
Brandon Street Natural Area is just west of the corner of 26th and Brandon Street (2 blocks west of Delridge). We work from 10-2. Volunteers can expect to pull weeds and wheelbarrow mulch. It is a family friendly day of work along a beautiful day section of the trail by Longfellow Creek. Folks should bring water and a lunch.
Nice day to work outdoors, too, with the cloud cover. Drop by & be a hero. If you’re wondering first, what’s a work party really like – Lina Rose from EarthCorps wrote us with a recap and some pix from the West Duwamish Greenbelt event last weekend; like the one today at Brandon Street, it involved a lot of mulch:
Click ahead to read Lina’s recap (including what this work will enable volunteers to do next time), see more pix (including one that might answer questions such as “gosh, would I really fit in at one of those work parties?”), and find out about an event next weekend:Read More
Updates on two sites we last mentioned two months ago, both with pix. First set, the doomed south Beach Drive trees. Left photo below is from June; right photo from this weekend, when we noticed the chopping had begun:
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Next set, Erskine & Dawson, the former “Thor’s Towing” property, soon a new home. Old structures seen in June at left; right photo is courtesy of WSB reader Luckie (in the week since she took it, construction has begun):
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Per 1 of 2 dueling press releases, WS will be in a pilot plan for recycling bins at beaches & parks next spring. (2 councilmembers suggest it’s their idea; Hizzoner says it’s his.)
Last weekend we drove past Me-Kwa-Mooks and saw a space roped off on the street in front, marked RESERVED FOR UDALL BUS TOUR. We were in something of a rush to start with; then we got sidetracked by something and completely forgot to look up what it was all about. Then this just appeared at the P-I site. How cool of them to side-trip to WS to help remove The Evil That Is Ivy.
Tonight’s sunset, from Alki, where the sand runs out on the eastern edge. How much might global warming/climate change/whatever-ya-wanna-callit alter our WS shorelines? The National Wildlife Federation is out with a new report attempting to answer that, while examining potential effects on other shoreline habitats around our region. Channel 7 tv news came out to Alki to do its summary of the NWF report and even traveled south of the point to cast a suspicious eye on the pilings-propped Harbor West complex, but we can’t find that clip online, yet. You can read the entire NWF document for yourself, however (and note the WS photo on page 13, taken by WSB reader/chasBlog blogger Charles Redmond). Bottom line? Maybe a 2-foot rise around here, so it sounds like Beach Drive waterfront houses are safe, for a century or so, at least.
We’ve confessed before that food-waste recycling is the one type of recycling we just haven’t quite gotten on board with yet. Looks like we’re going to have to; reports this morning (Times here, Weekly here) say we’re all going to be paying for pickup in less than 2 years. We hate paying for something we’re not using. Like the basic cable channels we don’t watch. Wish tv channels could be purchased a la carte. But we digress. So, we’ll get with the program. Maybe Sustainable West Seattle has advice! (More on the city’s “zero waste strategy” here.)
Thanks again to eagle-eyed goat-spotters for letting us know Rent-A-Ruminant (read a recent article about them) is in action along Admiral. Here’s the photographic proof:
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