West Seattle, Washington
28 Thursday
ORIGINAL 9:23 AM REPORT: We’re at West Seattle Rotary Viewpoint Park for the re-installation of the totem pole stolen eight months ago, and since repainted and restored. The official re-dedication isn’t until August 10th, but they’re putting it back into place today, and the pole is already here, about to be taken off the back of a flatbed truck by a Ness Crane that itself has been jacked up off the grass. Among those here: Duane Ruud, one of the Rotarians who sleuthed the theft even before police made an arrest, and Terry Boden, the first Parks employee with whom we spoke for our first story in early December, while trying to determine if the pole had been taken with or without authorization. This all may only take about an hour. 9:49 AM UPDATE: The pole’s been craned over to its base, where it’s being fastened. To see the winged pole briefly in flight was quite the sight:
(video added 2:04 pm)
If you missed our earlier stories, the pole is being reinstalled by a crew from Artech, the Renton-based art-restoration firm that also has given it a facelift – from fumigation to repainting. 10:30 AM: The reinstallation is almost over. The pole’s in place; the crew’s starting to fold up, and some of the onlookers have drifted away. By all accounts, it’s gone well. We’ll have a full report later with video and better photos (Christopher Boffoli was there shooting for WSB as well – here’s a great image he got as Artech’s Roger Waterhouse worked atop the pole:)
Just checked with Garrett Farrell from Seattle Parks, and he confirms that installation is complete for the final touches on the Hiawatha Playfield renovations – the rubberized track surface – so the fences are down and the field/track are open again.
Last night, a low-key celebration included arts and crafts for kids – one year after they got a brand-new playground at Delridge Community Center. The actual anniversary is today – July 17th, 2009, will be marked in Delridge history as the day hundreds of volunteers joined with KaBOOM! to make the playground dream come true.
(WSB photo from July 17, 2009)
Happy birthday!
Thanks to Fairmount Community Association‘s Sharonn Meeks for the heads-up: The date’s set for the first community meeting about the driving range scheduled to be built at the West Seattle Golf Course. Though a media announcement hasn’t gone out about it yet, postal-mail alerts have, and it’s confirmed on the project webpage: The meeting is set for 7 pm August 4th at the golf course. The $3.4 million driving range is an element of the city’s Golf Master Plan, with design under way now and construction set to start next year.
Inside a hangar-size building in Renton, the totem pole stolen last November from West Seattle Rotary Viewpoint Park lies under a ladder-suspended fan, looking for all the world like a hospital patient, which it is, in a way. The “hospital” is the secure – Department of Homeland Security seals and all – facility of Artech, which not only is a premier restoration business, but also, we learned, staffed by a team including more than a few West Seattleites. They are working on the pole, with repairs and paint, to prepare it for return to West Seattle and a rededication ceremony on August 10th. More photos ahead:Read More
Just got this from Garrett Farrell at Parks, regarding the Hiawatha track installation:
The rubber track subcontractor ATLAS TRACK has been delayed on another local job and the work will not start until the Monday the 12th at Hiawatha. The contractor is opening the fence and the public will have access until Monday morning.
Along with Myrtle Reservoir Park and the Hiawatha Playfield track, there’s more Seattle Parks work under way in West Seattle right now: Drove by Delridge Playfield and noticed the fences going up around the field, which is getting new turf funded by the Parks and Green Spaces Levy. Parks’ communications team confirms that construction work is beginning – they’ve just updated the project’s webpage, which points out that the finished field will incorporate “two striped soccer fields, one softball field, one baseball field, one woman’s lacrosse field overlaying the north soccer field, one men’s lacrosse field overlaying the south soccer field, two striped Ultimate fields overlaying the south soccer field, and one smaller Ultimate field demarcated with ‘cone dots’ overlaying the north soccer field.” Parks says the field is expected to reopen by early October, as per the contract we reported here a month ago.
The fences are going up around the track at Hiawatha Playfield today, as the Parks Department had warned field users would happen – this is so the last phase of the Hiawatha renovations, the rubberized track, can be installed. Project manager Garrett Farrell says the contractor has until July 23rd to finish the job, so the track and field are scheduled to be off-limits for the next few weeks. (Summer events at Hiawatha including the July 16 Family Fun Fest and West Seattle Hi-Yu Junior Court Coronation, the July 17-18 Mediterranean Fantasy Fest, and the July 20th Hi-Yu Concert in the Park – with West Seattle Volunteer Recognition Award winners honored! – are on the other side of the community center.)
Back in April, Seattle Parks announced it was taking name suggestions for High Point Playfield. On followup, they explained to WSB that it was a process triggered by a request to name it in honor of Walt Hundley, the department’s first African-American superintendent. Today, it’s official – Parks has announced three new facility names citywide, including Walt Hundley Playfield in High Point. Here’s the official news release.
With today’s weather looking to have no trouble meeting the criteria for opening the city-run wading pools – sunny and at least 70 degrees – here’s the reminder that the schedules have changed for all but one in West Seattle, because of the midyear budget cuts. According to the revised schedule, the two that should be open today are Lincoln Park (the only one in West Seattle that’s still open daily if warm enough), 11 am-8 pm, and Hiawatha (open Mon.-Tues.-Wed.), noon-6:45 pm. Here’s the full citywide schedule (PDF).
2 notes about Hiawatha Playfield: First, the lights will be on for a few hours Sunday night to discourage people from setting off fireworks on the synthetic (and relatively new) turf – part of a citywide program, as Seattle Parks explains here; then on Monday, Parks’ Garrett Farrell confirms, the plan is still on to close the Hiawatha track/field to apply the finishing touches – rubberized track. Farrell explains, “Cold, wet weather last year did not allow us to put the new rubber track surface in place. Contractors will fence off the track July 5th and apply the new surface. There will be no access across the track to the field for two weeks.”
We’re at City Hall downtown, where the Seattle Design Commission has given its blessing to the West Seattle Reservoir/Westcrest Park project design shown at last Saturday’s community meeting. From the Parks Department, project manager Susanne Friedman was there, along with Parks’ Michael Shiosaki, and SiteWorkshop architect Mark Brands. Commission members expressed not only support but even excitement about some of its potential elements, particularly the possibility for much of the landscaping to be planted as “Garry Oak savannah” (above).
They also liked the proposal to pay tribute to the underground reservoir with a grid of squares echoing the columns beneath, as well as markers on its corners (explained in the screenshot above, taken from Saturday’s presentation). A few new bits of information: Friedman said they still have “some details to go back and vet with Seattle Public Utilities” regarding “load limits” atop the covered reservoir; Brands said Parks is talking with the Department of Neighborhoods regarding “alternative funding” for the orchard/community garden proposed as part of the project. He explained the offleash-dog-park expansion that drew the most questions and concerns Saturday; commission members thought the suggested multiple-gate scenario had promise for getting people between what will then be two separate areas for dog romping. West Seattle-residing member Brendan Connolly gave the project team kudos for recognizing the importance of the nearby West Duwamish Greenbelt forest, but suggested perhaps an even “stronger response,” like a loop trail that takes people into the forest and back out to the park, to tie the two together more closely. There was some concern about a lack of lighting; Brands explained they’d like to consider solar, but “its cost is prohibitive right now” – maybe there are future possibilities.
WHAT’S NEXT: The Design Commission will see the project once more; the Arts Commission is scheduled to take a look at that aspect of the project (we’re checking to see if it’s on the agenda for the group’s July meeting). And, as Friedman said on Saturday, a public open house will be scheduled in fall to show an updated design, before final construction plans are made.
Just three days after the final design meeting for the new West Seattle Reservoir/Westcrest Park expansion, two updates tonight. First one goes with the video above, which was shared by Highland Park’s Deanie Schwarz, who explains:
At about four-thirty this morning, I was awakened by what sounded like giant chupacabra nails grating across a blackboard. I flew to my window, and what did I see? No chuppie, but the mammoth digger used for the deep pilings on the reservoir project.
The Mid-Mountain company, the behemoth’s owner, had till six AM to have the big digger out of the city limits. The trailer awaiting the big noisy tractor to sluggishly amble its way down a hill on Cloverdale was itself too lumbering and unwieldy to negotiate a loading location closer to the park. When the same trailer delivered the Big Digger to Westcrest two years ago to begin West Seattle’s own Big Dig, a bit of trouble ensued on that tiny hill wherein the trailer, to put it briefly, got kind of stuck. It was a problem the trailer driver and crew did not want to revisit, so today’s exit was on the flats of 9th Ave.
So, as the Highland Park neighborhood near Westcrest bid loud and amazing earthmovers adieu, the summer sun rose at dawn on a horizon, quiet, serene and awaiting a new era of a very lovely and much-improved park.
Speaking of said park …
NOTE #2: The newly unveiled design for the 20 added acres of parkland at the newly covered (and decreased-in-size) reservoir – shown in our story on Saturday’s community meeting – goes before the Seattle Design Commission this Thursday. The city-appointed, volunteer board reviews major projects like this, and is scheduled to hear at 10 am Thursday from project manager Susanne Friedman and landscape architect Mark Brands. The SDC meets in the Boards and Commissions Room at City Hall downtown (map), and the meeting is open to the public. P.S. We didn’t include this in Saturday’s report, but here’s the concept for the new parkland’s art project, unveiled by kinetic sculpture artist David Boyer at the meeting:
(The grassy west half of Junction Plaza Park, just before the dedication ceremony)
ORIGINAL 5:35 PM REPORT: Quite the crowd at the corner of 42nd and Alaska, and the event is about to start, ceremonial ribbon-cutting at all. Lots of Junction luminaries are here – and other parks supporters – plus City Councilmembers Sally Bagshaw and Tom Rasmussen, present and past chairs of the council’s Parks Committee, deputy Parks Superintendent Eric Friedli, and Parks Board members including chair Jackie Ramels of Alki.
Todd Carden of Elliott Bay Brewery Pub is opening the ceremony, recalling how the vision dates back a decade, and how creating the park has been a true public-private partnership. 5:47 PM: Carden has just declared the park open – after the ribbon-cutting, and a series of short speeches – here’s our video of the ribboncutting:
With the big scissors, that’s Erica Karlovits, president of the Junction Neighborhood Organization, and Susan Melrose, executive director of the West Seattle Junction Association, who co-chaired the final push for park completion. (Karlovits and Melrose walked away from the stage cheering, “It’s dedicated!” Right about this time last year, they were still collecting donations – in jars and barrels at West Seattle Summer Fest.) The young helper in the video is Mia Presser, daughter of Junction-based TouchTech Systems proprietor Brian Presser.
6:01 PM: Just talked with Steve and Sharon Huling – there’s a plaque in the “performance area” on the north side of the park bearing the inscription “The Huling Family/2010” – it’s in this photo with the Hulings and son Grant:
And of course, we talked about the forthcoming Trader Joe’s on one of his sites in The Triangle – we’d spoken to him shortly after the company made the official announcement earlier this month. (Steve Huling also tells us that brother Tom Huling and Tom’s wife Lori wanted to be there too to celebrate the park’s opening, but they’re on vacation.)
Meantime, violinist Pasquale Santos is playing “Don’t Stop Believing,” and that is a fitting anthem for the West Seattleites who worked so long and hard to make this park a reality.
(6:48 pm note – Event’s over, but we’ll be adding more photos and video!)
And now, just as a new park is being dedicated, there are two more Seattle Parks projects under construction in West Seattle: Work started at Pro Parks Levy-funded Myrtle Reservoir Park last week (as reported here), and this week – thanks to Mike and Kate for the tip! – construction is under way at Fairmount Playground (map). It’s a Parks and Green Spaces Levy-funded project, and it’s replacing some classic-but-old playground equipment — Mike and Kate’s note pointed out that a backhoe was “mangling the rocket” as they wrote; however, project manager Kelly Davidson says the merry-go-round will be reinstalled. The second and final community design meeting was held last January (here’s our report); you can see the final design here (PDF). The new playground at Fairmount is expected to be finished in August. ADDED 10:21 AM: We e-mailed Davidson to ask about the work – she mentioned she had some images of the old equipment. So for posterity’s sake, here’s “the rocket”:
Tomorrow night, you’re invited to celebrate West Seattle’s newest park, at the dedication ceremony for Junction Plaza Park – where the finishing touches have been going in (check the bench in our photo taken early this afternoon, one of three alongside the grassy oval on its west side). We noted here earlier this month that Councilmember Sally Bagshaw, who chairs the council’s Parks Committee, was planning to attend; she just announced via Twitter that her predecessor in that role, West Seattle-residing Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, will be on hand too. The Parks Department had previously announced that Deputy Superintendent Eric Friedl would participate as well, and that music will be provided by violinist Pasquale Santos. The dedication’s scheduled to start at 5:30 pm tomorrow (Tuesday) – if you haven’t been to the park yet, it’s on the northwest corner of 42nd and Alaska, and it’s been more than five years in the making, with tons of volunteer help and donations.
(Rendering of new “design concept” for the park atop now-covered West Seattle Reservoir in Highland Park)
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
Extra space for offleash dogs, new parking, a “skate dot,” and kinetic-sculpture art likened to characters from Wall-E are all parts of the design concept for the West Seattle Reservoir/Westcrest park expansion, just unveiled this morning during the project’s fourth and final public design meeting at Southwest Community Center.
In general, comments were positive, though concerns remain – read on for the key points of what’s new and what people are concerned about – we also have images from this morning’s presentation, which isn’t on the Parks website yet:Read More
The “School’s Out Bash” is an annual tradition for High Point Community Center – but this year, they moved it to HP’s Commons Park, and what a perfect night: Hundreds came for free fun, including food, field games, and face painting:
That’s Laura Wilburn from High Point CC. Bounce houses drew a crowd too:
Wondering what else is up this summer, at HPCC and West Seattle’s other community centers? Here’s the summer brochure.
<(From left, Sharon, Marcie, Marie, Jane, Kyle and Joan from West Seattle’s Endolyne Garden Club last Saturday)
One week after the sun-splashed planting party in which volunteers like the group above helped place 1,000 native plants at Junction Plaza Park, the city has sent out another reminder (see it here) that the park dedication (first announced last month) is coming up in 10 days – 5:30 pm June 29th, one week from Tuesday. Beyond the basics in the announcement, we asked the Parks Department if there’s word yet on who will join in the dedication event, along with the West Seattleites who have worked so hard (like the planting volunteers!) to make it reality. Here’s the plan so far, according to Parks’ Karen O’Connor: The city will be represented by Councilmember Sally Bagshaw, who chairs the Parks and Seattle Center Committee, and Deputy Parks Superintendent Eric Friedli; the music they’re promising will be provided by popular Seattle violinist Pasquale Santos. Friends of Junction Plaza Park hopes the weeknight evening scheduling means more people can come celebrate the long-awaited completion of the park (northwest corner of 42nd/Alaska).
(Photo credits: Top, courtesy Endolyne Garden Club; bottom, WSB photo taken last Sunday)
The Morgan Community Association just got word from project manager Virginia Hassinger: Construction of Myrtle Reservoir Park starts Monday, and should be done by mid-September.
It’s been in our calendar a while, but local Seattle Parks and Recreation Community Centers staffers are working hard to get the word out too, because their centers are all co-sponsors – so in case you haven’t heard about it, June 23 – next Wednesday, the first day of summer vacation for all the local kids who aren’t out till next Tuesday – is Olympic Day at West Seattle Stadium:
Ages 3-12 – Fun, friendly competition for the whole family, where everyone is a winner! Join us for old-fashioned field games and Olympic-themed activities for all abilities. Try your skills at three-legged races, sack hop, egg on a spoon and much more. The Opening Ceremonies will feature Olympic athlete Emily DeRiel and Paralympic athlete Mike Peters. Then celebrate the evening with a performance by the Recess Monkeys! This event is sponsored by South Park, Hiawatha, Delridge, Alki, High Point and Southwest community centers!
It all happens 5-8 pm Wednesday 6/23 – which is the anniversary of the founding of the modern Olympic movement.
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
Though the county project manager’s first response to that demand during April’s Morgan Community Association meeting was to suggest that residents file a public-disclosure request to force the county to give up the data, some information now appears to be coming out without quite that much of an additional fight.
With a “technical information meeting” looming this Saturday in West Seattle, documents are beginning to appear on a Technical Information page that’s part of the Puget Sound CSO Control Projects website – you can see the first round of links here.
This wasn’t announced to news media – nor was the creation of a new group to participate in the feedback process – but they’re both part of the newest developments in this ongoing controversy, as was a discussion we covered at last week’s city Parks Board meeting:
(2008 WSB photo of Delridge wading pool)
Two followups to this morning’s news about city budget cuts: First, the wading pool schedule is now available as a PDF on the Seattle Parks website. Here’s the document; the highlights –
Delridge: Thursday-Friday-Saturday noon-6:45 pm, starting June 26th
EC Hughes: Wednesday-Thursday-Friday noon-7 pm, starting June 30th
Hiawatha: Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday noon-6:45 pm, starting June 28th
Highland Park: Closed (awaiting conversion to spray park)
Lincoln Park: Every day 11 am-8 pm, starting June 26th
South Park: Sunday-Monday-Tuesday noon-7 pm, starting June 27th
That leaves eastern West Seattle with no 7-day-a-week pool, a situation that stirred some controversy two years ago (Delridge eventually got a seventh day). Also a note on the Parks budget cuts regarding maintenance — a little more insight comes from an internal memo that Acting Superintendent Christopher Williams sent to Parks employees:
We will hold three park maintenance positions vacant in each Park District for the last half of 2010. This will save about $0.3 million but will have a serious impact on our ability to maintain our parks to their current excellent standard. The Parks Division is also working on some ways to test different reduction strategies this summer to try to identify the ways that have the least impact on the public.
Again, from our earlier report, the full presentation given to councilmembers this morning can be seen here.
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