The park’s schematic. Now it’s time to find out how things fleshed out. View Larger Diagram
- After years of acquisition, community leadership and good old grassroots action, final design is ready to be unveiled:
This week you have two opportunities to do a HUGE favor to the development of Broadway Hill Park, the new park to be built at the corner of Federal and Republican. There are two presentations coming up, to be held at the park space, where landscape architects from Site Workshop will be presenting the final finished design and you can come by and see it. If you can make it, your time will be recorded as a contribution to the park, in the form of demonstrating community involvement in its development, and match for the grant funding this project.
Thursday, October 4th, 6-7:30pm
Sunday, October 7th, 1-2:30 pmRight now Friends of Broadway Hill Park’s main aim is fundraising to get the park built as soon as possible. Attending one (or both!) presentations and sticking around for an hour or so will go a long way towards helping the project move forward. So please stop by if you can! Bring friends, family, coworkers, acquaintances, and total strangers along with you. And make sure to sign in.
The unveiling will be the first time the plan for features like a “natural play area” and community garden space will have be shared publicly. Parks told CHS earlier this year that the construction budget for the park could top $400,000.
In 2010, the city acquired the Broadway Hill land for $2 million after a townhome development failed. While the city had cash to acquire the land, the Seattle Parks process leaves the design and construction end of things requiring significant community capital campaigns. The Friends of FedRep group — Now Friends of Broadway Hill Park — formed to help guide creation fo the park.
- The group that represents the community’s needs and priorities for is looking for new board members:
CAPA is currently seeking to add new board members! We are especially interested in those with skills in fundraising, outreach/PR, web design, social media and event production. We also welcome inquiries from people who would like to work on projects specific to the park, especially those which might exemplify the issues Cal Anderson championed. If you’re interested in getting involved, submit an application to [email protected] by November 2, 2012. We’re looking forward to hearing from you!
Details and the application can be found in the PDFs attached to this post. We wrote about CAPA’s background here in 2011.
- Work is slated to be underway this month in the $800,000 renovation of the play area in the northeast corner of the public greenspace. The wading pool stays but much of the equipment the city says is outdated and unsafe is on the way out —
including the giant bone climbing sculpture. Work is expected to be completed by January. Here’s a rendering of what your kids will be playing on in 2013.
UPDATE: Parks updated the situation around some of the classic play pieces at Volunteer Park:
I wanted to let you know that although the play equipment providers did not put the existing Block (“bone”) play sculpture created by Chas Smith in 1962 in their rendering it will remain in the renovated play area. The design also retains the shooting star paving feature and Pablo’s plaque installed as part of the 1991 Neighborhood Matching Fund project.
- CHS introduced the new Volunteer Park Trust organization last week.
- is getting a new p-patch:
By next year, Horiuchi Park will have a new feature – a P-Patch community garden. To help design the P-Patch, the Yesler Terrace and First Hill communities are invited to a meeting on October 11 from 6:00 – 8:00 p.m. at the Yesler Community Center (917 East Yesler Way). There will be food and children’s activities available.
Funded by Seattle Housing Authority with assistance from the HUD Choice Neighborhoods Initiative, the new community garden will provide a place for community members to grow fresh organic food and connect with neighbors. The legacy of the parks namesake, the late artist Paul Horiuchi, will be honored throughout the design process and construction of the community garden through artistic elements and historical context of his work.
When complete, the Horiuchi P-Patch community garden will be managed by the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods P-Patch Community Gardening Program.
I cannot believe that the renovation of the play area at Volunteer Park is costing $800,000! Why can’t they just leave it as is, with perhaps some added safety features? That would cost much less.
Well not sure if it’s too much but the current state is pathetic and not up to par with just about every other play around in the vacinity. Considering what a gem the park is it definitely needs to be gutted IMO.
Isn’t that an amount that would almost entirely retrofit and repair the conservatory? Or finally get some decent fences around the koi fish ponds? Don’t get me wrong I do appreciate the work on a new park for the kids to play on, but it just seems like too much money for new playground equipment..
A better use of the $2 million that purchased the Federal and Republican park should have been used for improvements to Volunteer Park. A lot of these small ‘pocket parks’ seem to only be used nefariously.
Couldn’t agree more with Prost Seattle. I know its all different budgets and all that. But these little one-block parks are just very spiffy doggie bathrooms -and in this case with a neighborhood full of pretty gardens and trees and greenspace already where they aren’t *that* necessary. Lets put our money and attention to the “real” parks such as Volunteer Park and its precious conservatory which are beautiful, stately and really something worth spending time in…where neighbors come together. That park is the reason I live where I live (Capitol Hill) and I am so grateful for it.
I live neer the park at Summit and Olive. There are no bums hanging out there. No muggers or drugs. Just a cool little park.
The current playground equipment is not OSHA compliant and needs to be replaced, and the budget itself is not only for the playground equipment but for additional landscaping (largest portion) and improvements in that area of the park (which is much needed).
You may be happy to know that while attending one of the community planning meetings I heard that about $200k of the budget was planned to be diverted from the playground improvements for other things. My guess is that the ultimate cost of the budget will be way under the $800k and the rest will be quietly moved over to other projects, which seems underhanded to me if it is true. It seems like a nice thing for the CHS blog to look into.
Why is the new playground plans at Volunteer Park so uninspiring? Well, you can thank the Friends of Seattle’s Olmstead Parks for this. As they don’t want to sully the Olmstead Park Legacy you won’t be seeing any especially cool features in the design. So make sure to prepare your petticoats when you visit the park next Spring.
I am glad that they are keeping the wading pool, regardless, and especially hope that they are playful with the design of the bottom.
NOT ENOUGH SWINGS, AGAIN!