Seattle's Capitol Hill Community Rallies Around New Park

SEATTLE, Washington, August 10 -- Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood is known for a lot of things: its nightclub district, great restaurants, and its coffee shop circuit. What it isn't known for is its green space. While Capitol Hill has a number of parks, it is the most densely populated neighborhood in Seattle. Many residents are apartment dwellers with no yard of their own, meaning gardening and open space is in high demand.

Earlier this year, the Seattle Parks Department unveiled its plans to turn a parking lot in the heart of Capitol Hill's western slope into a park. The firm chosen to design the park was Mithun, a well known urban design firm. In Seattle it is best known for its work on the light rail station plan.

After three design meetings with the participation of community members, the Parks Department decided that the new park would also include a number of garden plots or p-patches. The final design was created around the concept of an urban meander, with a central curving path running through multiple terraces, new trees planted on the street, and lawn and native plantings interspersed with garden plots. The mixed use space promised to be a central gathering point for the community.

However, in a presentation to the Design Review Board earlier this year, it was revealed that the Parks Department was $80,000 short of the money it needed to build the park as presently designed. Rather than complain that neighborhood had been let down, the community immediately rallied to raise money for the new park. The Unpaving Paradise Project was started by the Capitol Hill Community Council's Open Space Committee in order to bring the community together around the project and raise enough money to make it happen.

The Unpaving Paradise Project's first outreach event will be at National Park(ing) Day on September 19^th. They will be hosting one of the many mini-parks in parking spaces on Broadway in Capitol Hill. Unpaving Paradise also plans to make appearances at the Capitol Hill Farmer's Market, and hopes to be able to host a number of benefits before the John and Summit Park begins construction sometime next fall.

To keep up on Unpaving Paradise's fundraising efforts and further John and Summit developments, visit www.chcc.wikidot.com or contact unpaving.paradise@gmail.com.

For more information on the park design and the acquisition and design process, go to the John and Summit page at the Seattle Parks Department website: http://www.seattle.gov/parks/proparks/projects/JohnSummitParkDevelopment.htm.

Sources:

Shari Olson, Out of the Woods, Pacific Northwest

http://www.mithun.com/, Light Rail Station Plan

www.chcc.wikidot.com, Park Fundraising Effort Name: Unpaving Paradise Capitol Hill Community Council wiki