Planners call the remaking of Seattle’s waterfront a “hundred-year decision” because it will affect generations of Seattleites and visitors to the city.
Last week, the Waterfront Seattle committee, a group of bold-faced names from government, labor, business and philanthropy released a 59-page design summary detailing the remaking of the Seattle waterfront after the demolition of the Alaskan Way Viaduct is complete.
Though not a legal or binding document, and carrying an as-yet unfunded price tag of more than $1 billion, the design summary, available at waterfrontseattle.org, nonetheless foretells a series of changes based upon guiding principles adopted by a resolution of the Seattle City Council.
First among these is to “create a waterfront for all.”
“The waterfront,” the document states, “should engage the entire city. It should be a place for locals and visitors alike, a place where everything comes together and co-mingles effortlessly.”
Comingling — of public and private, of commerce and free speech — is rarely effortless. In our parks, on our sidewalks and at transit stops, public space is often contested space.
The remaking of the waterfront stands to improve access to the urban spaces we already enjoy and to add to them.
An urban street and pedestrian promenade designed to prioritize people over vehicles will occupy the footprint of the Alaskan Way Viaduct.
For Pioneer Square, at the south end of the project, planners envision a pebble beach extending into Elliott Bay between South Washington Street and Yesler Way. It would have a boardwalk and a natural look, with boulders and logs. Somewhere, someone may be wondering: Will there be benches, too, and if so, can one sleep on them?
Some have said that the makeover is a chance for the city to finally get it right when it comes to our waterfront.
When the tunnel is completed in 2015, workers will begin rebuilding the public piers, a primary public space in the new waterfront plan. The space shows signs of wear, but that hasn’t kept people from using it.
On a recent sunny weekday, visitors and locals were lounging in yellow plastic chairs set out on an expanse of weathered wood.
Under the concept conceived by James Corner Field Operations — designer of Manhattan’s celebrated High Line — the place stands to get a bit fancier. It would be used as a roller rink and the tie-up for a floating saltwater barge pool.
The latter could be a fantastic idea and, as Knute Berger pointed out in a recent Crosscut column, also a fanciful one.
Even conventional, land-locked swimming pools are notoriously costly to maintain; they are widely seen among public officials as a drain on resources. At a time when the city has shut down children’s wading pools for lack of funding, it’s hard to imagine supporting such high-flying attractions.
“These things can become burdens over time,” Berger writes. “They didn’t even want to continue the popular waterfront trolley.”
To plan a project that will be enjoyed a century from now, the architects of the next waterfront —which in a way is all of us — are called on to think big.
After all, few could’ve predicted a few years ago that a giant Ferris wheel would become the area’s splashiest attraction. These days, the $13 ride draws lines longer than the length of a football field.
In the Seattle of the future, a roller rink or floating pool may be just the ticket to enliven a two-mile swath of shoreline.
Here’s hoping all of us can afford the price of admission.