Queen Anne’s Newest Park Feels like a Parking Lot

parking%20lot.jpg

If parking lots designed parks they would all look like the new Counterbalance pit at the base of Queen Anne.

Generally the park functions as an outdoor place for recreational activities or offers an aesthetically pleasing open space to relax or stroll. Counterbalance Park does neither. That isn’t to say it breaks the conventional mold of how we define the modern park because it doesn’t do anything at all.

Deemed an “Urban Oasis” by the Mayor’s Office and the clandestine agents of the Uptown Alliance, the completed park looks like a half-baked development abandoned before the walls were put up. It’s basically 12,000 square feet of nothing.

Considering it took almost a decade to get something into the space, you would think there might have been time for more inspiration. The city, county and friends poured over a million dollars into the “vision” yet, a week after the “grand opening,” we’re left wondering where the money went.

Counterbalance Park features benches, a drinking fountain and those starter trees that line the sidewalks in the monotonous town homes of Snoqualmie Ridge. No real trees, no BBQ pit, no basketball court, no sculpture art, no mural, no funky lamps, no swing set, no nothing. There’s nothing to do there except maintain perfect posture and inhale fumes. The benches are the institutional kind with divider bars designed to repel homeless squatters, so you can’t slouch while enjoying the park’s zero amenities. Welcome to the place where minimalism meets worthlessness.

Seattlest visited the city’s newest park this week to see if there was a hidden charm to be redeemed upon first-hand experience. The answer was no.

Most neighbors will consider the bench and deck result an upgrade from the gravel pit that commanded the location for the better part of the past decade but, considering the amount of money the city paid contractors for what is essentially a mindless alternative to the earth itself, it’s hard to pretend the city accomplished anything other than not selling the land.

Simply a patch of grass and maybe a boulder would have at least added some greenery and a nice place to perch on a dry day. However, Counterbalance Park doesn’t condone any perching of any sort. You aren’t meant to stay. It’s as if the city designed the public area with the sole function of being inhospitable to actual humans. The park doesn’t feel utilized, it feels sterilized. So nobody wins except for maybe the Uptown Alliance, whoever they are.

To visualize Counterbalance Park add some skinny trees and a few benches to this image from SlightlyNorth via the Seattlest Flickr Pool

Contact the author of this article or email tips@seattlest.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By John in Miscellaneous on July 25, 2008 9:30 AM

Comments [rss]

jmorgan

snailcabbage is correct - this park actually isn't finished yet. They are adding colorful tables & chairs as well as the lighting feature on the short wall & etching on the metal bench part.

I think the designers did what they could with such a small space. Once the trees grow out it will be much nicer for greenery, but it will take a while!

ckesegi

The only aspect that elevates the Counterbalance Park one step beyond that of the status owned by suburban backyard decks is it's location in an urban setting...

A notably greater ratio of green coupled with some sort of waterflow would have made this a veritable centerpiece for the LQA urban cluster for all of those in it's vicinity to take pride in and enjoy.

ronaldholden

Worth noting, too, that the photo "illustrating" the post has nothing to do with this particular park. My sense is, like commenter #9, that it's like a plaza.

jwhieger

A miracle?

I still think they could have added something to do, like swing sets or a b-ball court.

It looks like a deck and I just think they shouldn't have stopped there. (Grabage cans aren't going to sway me)

I agree with the comment above about the grafitti, it could breath some life into this thing.

snailcabbage

I'm a landscape architect. LAs design parks. I live two blocks directly up the hill from the park.

When it comes down to it, I may have designed some things differently, but it’s a small, urban park. It's more like a plaza. There’s only so much you can do with an urban space that small, and I think it follows good European precedents in its nature, where space is tight. Paris has many tiny parks that are trees and benches sitting on hard surfaces.

It takes a while for a park to become all that it can be. People need to start using it, things need to grow. I may have picked different trees, but once the Ginkgos get bigger it will feel different. Ginkgos, and not many of them, were probably picked because the space doesn't get much light and that specific tree has an open canopy. Grass would not be appropriate there, it wouldn’t establish due to people cutting across and the shadiness.

A lot of it isn’t actually there yet or completely installed yet- an artist has designed a feature that will splash the big retaining walls below the buildings to the north and east that aren’t operational yet. I think that the design of the site revolves around this light feature that hasn't been put on-line yet. And I’d guess that chairs and tables might be a part of the design that aren’t in yet. They don’t even have garbage cans, so it’s a little premature to judge the space, in my opinion.

To an earlier question, yes, it's very difficult to design public spaces. Throw in the heavy community process in this city- wealthy people wanting to design out the homeless, condo owners not wanting restricted views, and government entities like the DOT that have setbacks and visibility stipulations, on top of the indivitual reviews and requirements of Seattle Parks, City of Seattle, DOT, Public Utilities.... There are a lot of things that restrict that site- the bus lines overhead, the DOT's guidelines for the intersection, the powerlines that prevent larger trees along the street, its shadiness makes growing some things tricky.... Fountains are expensive and oftentimes controversial due to sanitation/public health/safety issues, and they're oftentimes ugly when they're broken or drained for the winter. I’m sure that the QA community didn’t want somewhere homeless could sleep like the park due northwest of it, so much planting, trees, or grass was eliminated that way, too. I heard that that was once the site of a gas station; if so, there are probably soil issues limiting the amount of excavation that could be done.

I think it’s a miracle they pulled off a new park in this location at all, in some ways.

jwhieger

I think the politicians are going out of their way to disappoint us.

Taylor Hain

I was walking by there the other day. What total and utter shit. I saw a couple there attempting to somehow 'cuddle' on one of those benches. Suffice to say, they failed.

Troy Morris

I noticed them doing something over there during an extended walk. Now I'm disappointed. I'm actually more fond of the gravel that was there. At least that could be interactive.

Are there any park designers in the room? Is designing parks like... super duper difficult?

jessejb

A public space that will make people want to leave after 5 minutes?

Sounds like something Queen Anne would do.

bconnolly

I foresee a lot of skateboarding going on in this park.

ChrisB

It's only a marginal improvement over what was there before. I really hope that they do something extravagant in the future like, I don't know, add some color?

It's kind of sad that I look at it and find that I can't wait to see what the graffiti artists bring to the space.

jrickard

I live close by. I would agree. A fountain would have been nice, the flow of water to drown out the sound of the city could have created a place of tranquility.