Now that the weather is getting cooler and we have water on site, we’re seeing new plantings in the rain gardens and a few trees scattered throughout the park. There will be a couple more planted later in the winter since Parks has to wait for them to go dormant before they can be moved.

…we’ve got trees and more on the way!

The irrigation system should be complete soon, and if all goes well, they will be planting sod next week. We’ll continue to keep you posted.

Be on the lookout for an opening celebration before the end of this year. If you’d like to help us plan, please reach out to eastballard@gmail.com.

You’ve probably noticed that construction of Gemenskap Park has stopped and you might be asking yourself, where’s the grass, the trees, the plants? They’re not done yet are they? Well, we had the same questions and so contacted our Parks Manager to find out what’s happening. Here’s the scoop…..

The contractor, Jansen, has completed as far as they can until water and electrical are hooked up. The hole with the pipe in it is the 12” water main.  We are in the queue for Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) to tap the main and install the meter.  When that’s done, they’ll be able to connect it to the irrigation. The electrical cabinet with meter and irrigation controller have been installed.  We are now in the queue for Seattle City Light (SCL) to install power to the meter, which powers the irrigation controller and lights.

Unfortunately, the Parks Dept hasn’t received any exact dates from SPU or SCL, except that the park is on their work order list. Once water and electricity are hooked up, they can start planting, since it doesn’t make sense to install plants without the capability to water them!

This stall may delay our plans for a celebration this summer, however, we’re hoping to host a street cleanup event and a neighborhood watch meeting focused around the park this summer, so stay posted for event dates. If you love to plan events, please contact us a at eastballard@gmail.com we’d love to have you join our team!

UPDATE ON THE UPDATE:
While the park is awaiting electricity and water hookup, the street and intersection work is complete. The Parks Dept is meeting with SDOT this week to get final review of the street. Upon receiving SDOT approval they will be allowed to open up 14th Ave NW. We’ll keep you posted!

The city is quickly coming to the end of the construction phase for Gemenskap park (should be end of May), and the Parks Dept would like to partner with the East Ballard Community to put on a big party this summer to celebrate the culmination of the 13 years it has taken to transform this patch of pavement into a community park.

We’re currently seeking a few neighbors with party planning experience and time to team up with the Parks Dept on a planning committee.  Our initial meeting will be Tuesday May 22 at 7:30PM. If you’re interested in attending, please contact Dawn at eastballard@gmail.com for more details. Please also reach out if you’re interested, but that date doesn’t work for you.

Once we get a bit more organized, we’ll have a lot more opportunities for more neighbors to provide input and help with certain tasks. If you have a great idea, a special talent to share or just want us reach out to you for some help, please contact us and we’ll put you on the list.

And, of-course, we want you to come and celebrate with us! We’re shooting for a date in mid August when parks is ready to open up the lawn and landscaped areas to foot traffic. Stay tuned!

existing trees between 59th and 60th

For those of us who live on or close to 14th, we are already experiencing the changes that have come with constructing Gemenskap (Yuh-MEN-skawp) park. Jansen, Inc. has been onsite this past week and have seemed very helpful and easy for members of the community to approach, so that’s a good start.

One very noticeable thing that Jansen did this week was to post signs on 12 trees that will be removed along the east side of 14th. This amounts to ALL of the trees on the east side except for the large maple between 59th and 60th. This came as a shock to many in the neighborhood, since, at face value, it doesn’t make sense to remove green living things in order to create new green space.

Removing existing trees
We dove into the engineering drawings and spoke to the Parks Department to help see the bigger picture around the tree plan for the park. We took a look at the drawings and confirmed that the 12 trees that are currently marked for removal are the ones listed on the drawings. These include 11 Kwanzan cherry trees and 1 big leaf maple. We spoke with the parks department and they confirmed that in Feb, 2012, an SDOT arborist assessed the trees. The arborist advised that all of the cherry trees are infected with cherry bark tortrix (CBT) which is an invasive insect that feeds on the bark and girdles the tree leaving it open to other infestations. Nine of these cherry trees were rated low retention value and two were rated moderate by the arborist. Also note that Kwanzan cherries have a short life expectancy of 15-25 years, and these trees, according to the Seattle Street Tree Map, have been here since at least 1991. The big leaf maple that is slated for removal was identified as a high risk tree and removal was encouraged. The other maple was identified as healthy and will be retained. The multi-use path in the park will be designed with paving to accommodate the tree and root system.

black tupelo leaf in fall

yellowwood flowers

Replacing with new trees
Diving into the drawings again, we have identified that the 12 trees being removed will be replaced with 24 new trees: 1 Yellowwood, 1 Scarlet Oak, 2 Frontier Elm, 2 Black Tupelo,  and 17 Serviceberry. All but the Serviceberries will be 4-inch caliper size (about 14 ft  tall) when planted, and should grow to around 40-50 ft when mature. The Serviceberries will be planted in the rain gardens. They are listed in the drawing as shrubs, but are considered by Parks to be small trees. They will be 6 ft tall when planted and grow to around 10 ft when mature.

The big picture
The initial impact of losing the existing tree canopy will feel significant, both during construction and while the trees mature, but many factors were taken into consideration within the context of the overall design. Some of these factors include the health and age of the existing trees and their existing placement with respect to the new 12 ft wide multi-use path that will replace the existing sidewalk. When selecting new trees the designers were also sensitive to the community’s input for flowering trees. Although we will be losing the spring blossoms from the cherries, the new trees were selected for their spring flowering nature and many will have beautiful colors in the fall.

We heard from our Parks Project Manager, Toby Ressler, this week who shared with us some good news on the construction plans for Gemenskap Park. Here’s what we know:

• As of Friday Oct 6, Seattle Department of Transporation (SDOT) has approved and issued the Street Improvement Permit (SIP) for construction of the park.
• Construction start date is tentatively set for January 2, 2018, however, Seattle Parks are in discussion with the contractor, Jansen Inc., to outline the best time to begin construction while still providing safe pedestrian and vehicle accessibility on 14th Ave NW during construction.
• Construction will require a 2-3 month detour route on 14th Ave NW between NW 58th and NW 60th.
• Jansen Inc. anticipates completing the project in late spring 2018.

It looks like this is actually going to happen, and soon! We’ll continue to keep you informed as we receive new updates!

In the meantime, be sure to mark your calendar for Saturday Nov 4 10AM-1PM for our Clean Sweep event along 14th Ave NW. We’ll be posting an invite soon with more details!

It takes gemanskap to build a park!

Readers may remember that back in March, Seattle Parks and Recreation asked the community to submit name suggestions for the 14th Ave NW Park. The Park naming committee received over 60 unique name suggestions and after long deliberation announced their decision in a press release yesterday afternoon.

The new name for the 14th Ave NW park will be Gemenskap Park (pronounced Yuh-MEN-skawp), which is the Swedish word for community. The name was chosen “because this was a community initiated project and because of the area’s Swedish history and influence, the Park Naming Committee believes this unique park will help build community by turning parking into park space. While there are several Ballard parks that have Norwegian names, this is the first with a Swedish name.”

Now that the park has a name, let’s hope that it’s a good sign that the City will be breaking ground in the near future! We’ll keep you posted as we learn more.