What do you think about the design alternatives for Shoreline Town Center?
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Now's the time to say something if you would like to have an influence on the design.
The City is exploring design options for the Park at Town Center, located along Aurora Avenue between N 175th and N 185th Streets. The Berger Partnership, a consultant team hired by the City, incorporated community and stakeholder input into three design concepts for the space.
View the designs and help identify elements from each scheme that could be combined to create a preferred park plan. Comments will be accepted until June 1.
The three designs are:
On the Move
- Series of outdoor rooms
- Loop trail
- Ronald Place bricks are raised to grade
- Movable park elements
Reflection
- Rooms created by rows of trees
- Trail and Ronald Place bricks stay in place
- Design follows geometry of Midvale
- Water creates reflection
Center Stage
- Center stage performance space with rotating walls and water feature
- Trail winds from one edge of the park to the other
- Ronald Place bricks moved to fit design scheme
- Design uses Shoreline name and 14 neighborhoods
The next public workshop will be held on Wednesday, June 8. For more information about the park, visit the project page on the City's website.
Posts
13 comments:
What the @#$%^&^$#@ does "raised to grade" mean.
What part of "historical significance" does this City not understand?
Who is minding the store here?
What grade in history did all the supposed experts at this city receive in school?
Yes, what does this mean? Raised to equal what grade? Well, perhaps this article is meant to provoke folks into coming to meetings to partake more in creating Shoreline's future- a future that SHOULD have as many integral historical elements as possible in order to maintain some reasonable sense of it's identity.
I'm not sure what raised to grade means. What I do know is that disturbing the bricks in the remaining section of road that is owned by the city for people to see and learn from will destroy it's historical value. Once they lift the bricks it might as be concrete......
I would encourage the landscaper designers working on the master plan to be respectful of this landmark and find a creative solution to whatever the issue is and work around this very real piece of our history that was/is in the center of Shoreline.
The Ronald Place/North Trunk Road (aka "Red Brick Road") is a vital part of Shoreline's history.
It is not something to be tampered with just because there is a Town Center Park Plan afoot. If ANY of those bricks are are moved, "raised to grade" or used in some hair-brained redesign scheme, because some consultant wants to play with it, the North Trunk Road will be destroyed for all historic purposes.
It is an essential element of Shoreline's history. It is now in two sections because the City Council once before made a foolish vote to allow Walgreens to tear up section of it.
It was built in the early 1900's because Judge JT Ronald (former Seattle Mayor) wanted to bring development to his newly adopted community. Yes, Judge Ronald was also responsible for the development of the Ronald School in 1912. He was a visionary pioneer. This was a vital period of our community's history.
The Red Brick Road CANNOT be moved or tampered with for the transitory "park" concept, even if some people on staff or the community don't care about it. If you move the bricks, you have destroyed it. There is an EIS now underway and that process needs to be carried out. The EIS will have to study the Environmental Impact of the Town Center Plan.
The Red Brick Road is eligible for for designation by the National Historic Register according to the City's own documents on the Aurora Phase II.
The City Park can be designed around it, and it can retain the status in history that it deserves.
When will Shoreline realize its responsibility to protect our historic assets?
Janet Way, President
Shoreline Preservation Society
It's a road, people. Just a road. The bricks themselves are cool because they were made when making bricks was a trade and they were hand thrown - hand made. That's very interesting.
But the road, is a road. Nothing more. No one could convince me it is historical because of where it is placed.
Now, move those hand made artisan bricks into a useful and attractive design that is integrated into the park - I'm all for that.
The other night, I watched a PBS special about Dolly Madison and how she transformed what was essentially just a swampy little town into a nations capitol. She did it with charm, grace and talent. She decorated the presidents house and made it the people's house. then the British attacked in the 1812 War and she made sure that the Gilbert Stewart painting of George Washington was rolled up and rescued because she knew it would be a prize for the British as they ransacked the house and eventually burned it.
So, that painting, which wasn't really very old at that time was saved and became a symbol of our nation because Dolly Madison had the pluck to save it. Was it "just" a painting, "just" some paint and canvas, of just a General? Or was it something significant to our nation's history, something so precious that it was worth the effort to save it?
I think that the Red Brick Road is "just" as significant to our City and a symbol of how we came to be. Something real, something truly old and authentic, verified by the National Trust for Historic Places. Look it up.
It's not just me, or just a few "anti-development" people telling you this.
It is true and it is right.
It is our history and it must be preserved.
Dear Anon 1:18 - By the way, "making bricks" is still a trade. Laying bricks is still a trade. It is a point that the "red brick road" can teach. It is about craftsmanship and about people who make things, as opposed to people who don't know how to make anything.
Shoreline was founded by many people who made things, did big things.
Like Judge Ronald. He was Mayor of Seattle, founded a homestead, brought Highway 99 here, and founded a school.
This is worth commemorating by protecting what's left of one of his signature achievements, the Red Brick Road.
It's so sad that builders and developers have not studied and practiced enough how to create wonderful built environments around what is already there- whether built or natural. Let's see just how creative they can be. Let's give them no other choice, so they will try harder. If you give developers free reign, they will just do whatever. I still can't believe that the City of Shoreline has such a lax attitude about making huge alterations to ANYTHING of major historic value!
I appreciate reading all the comments. That in itself has been an education. Thanks to SAN for making it possible to have this online exchange and thank you to the many people who have contributed.
What a great point Anon 12:02!
Yes, the City should set the perameters and then the developers/designers should step up and work around the historic road. Instead, the City seems to be saying, "Anything goes"!
That is just not responsible. The City should enforce its heritage element in the Comp Plan.
The above comment is correct that the designers should learn what the criteria are and use them as tools and templates to design a great concept for the park and town center.
It's kind of like working around any other valuable element. For instance, if designers at Yellowstone are told to design a viewing area for Old Faithful, they must work around the geyser and the bottom line is to do NOTHING to harm it.
That is what these designers must do. Respect the historic resource.
Yeah, I know that brick making is "still a trade" but they don't hand throw them anymore. At least not in this country.
And really, the little bit of road to no where sits in a gully that fills with rain and mud most of they year, lovely. No one goes there and enjoys it - do you? Is it really so important to have something just to have it, even though no one enjoys it.
And, by the way, a road and a painting are VERY different things. Unless we take those bricks and move them around to make a work of art in a beautiful park. Now we are talking.
Just to keep something because it is old is short sighted. It is not lovely, becoming, useful.
It is like saving the stump of a tree because Judge Ronald's daughter used to swing from a tire on a limb from it in the front yard of their home.
Not everything old "has to be saved." Move on.
Dear Anti-History Person (Anon 9:37),
So celebrating a pile of bricks is worthy in your mind, but a bonafide,
Historic Asset (National Historic Register eligibility!) is not?
You know, you really belong in Lynnwood or Mill Creek where they celebrate a lot of "fake history" and "faux culture". A fake Mill and an endless mall. Is that what we want here? Don't we want to celebrate something real?
So, with the over $100K for this project, don't you think the City will have enough to fix a few drainage problems on the site? Is that a reason to tear up a historic, cultural asset?
You really need to move somewhere, where there are endless cookie cutter developments and new and shiny things. You are made for Lynnwood.
Actually, I love history. I'm quite the history buff. History is great. When it makes sense. When it adds to an area.
Ronald School - that's history. The Carnegie Library - http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/realestate/2014643437_realcarnegiebuilding03.html - that's history. San Francisco's Lombard Street, that's history.
This is a stub. An unattractive stub. An unnecessary stub. The bricks themselves are beautiful. Hand thrown works of art. The placement. Ugh.
Again, I reiterate, not everything old is worth saving.
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