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Posted May 1st, 2012 by Brice Maryman
Happy Bike to Work Month! Our bike racks are overflowing this morning, which must mean we’re off to the races for the A+E Bike to Work Challenge! (If you haven’t signed up and want to, please call Jessica at our office).
Posted April 16th, 2012 by Brice Maryman
As we head toward the final lap at Beacon Mountain, we thought we might share some of the latest visuals of what’s happening behind the construction fence. The text panels for the porous concrete were poured and performed wonderfully last week (see below), and pouring of the rest of the concrete spray pad will finish this week.
At the same time, the welder, Mike from Wilcox Garage, placed the rafters on the covered overlook, which allowed us to assemble the composite panoramic below looking to the Olympics. We’re loving the way the overlook frames the borrowed landscape and can’t wait to see it when it’s complete. Definitely click through to see the image at full size.
Posted March 19th, 2012 by Brice Maryman
Beacon Mountain Shelter. By Stephanie Bower, Architectural Illustration
As part of the Beacon Mountain project, three “Solar Shelters” will go online and begin creating energy on Wednesday at Jefferson Park.
Though the idea of having picnic shelters was always part of the project, funding wasn’t in place until Seattle Parks and Seattle City Light worked together to use a portion of funds from the Solar America Cities program from the U.S. Department of Energy to start the Community Solar program, which allows private rate-payers to invest in solar power on public lands within the City.
The program provides a low-cost way for the City to demonstrate their desire to find and use more sustainable sources of power and significantly lowers the barrier for private residents and businesses to “go solar,” which normally costs around $15,000 per household. Between now and 2020, the ratepayers who invested in the program should expect to get much of their initial capital investment returned to them through rebates on their electrical bills equal to the energy production at the solar shelter. After 2020, the energy from the shelters becomes part of the diversified portfolio of energy sources for the City.
Here’s a link to the King5 story. The project was also featured in Geekwire, the Seattle P-I, Sustainable Industries, the DJC and MyNorthwest.com
Posted March 9th, 2012 by Brice Maryman
Thanks to Kaid at NRDC for highlighting this amazing 38 second video from NASA looking at the growth patterns around Las Vegas Nevada over the last few decades. Astonishing images.
Posted November 8th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
Beacon Mountain at Jefferson Park is well under construction, with the rough grading approaching finished grade. A quick video from near the covered overlook gives some sense of the tremendous views that will be available when the site is finished.
Best viewed full screen.
Posted October 12th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
A visual poem, from the former Talking Heads lead singer. We recommend full screen in HD.
h/t Vermont’s Local Motion blog
Posted September 14th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
Bell Street Park Pavement Textures
Hewitt did some cool mock-ups of the pavement textures we’re considering for the rumbly middle tones in bell street park. We’re leaning toward the finer grain of the two and experimenting with convex and concave in terms of durability, accessibility, drainage, visuals, etc.
Posted September 13th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
Several SvR staff members took in a beautiful late-summer evening on the nearly completed Winslow Way as part of the Bainbridge Island Downtown Association’s Winslow in White fundraiser. Close to a thousand people–dressed in white–dined al fresco in the middle of the street as the sun set. Though the plantings aren’t in yet, the street is already serving as a wonderful stage for the community to come together and celebrate.
Posted September 9th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
SvR Design is honored to have been awarded the contract for King County’s Barton Basin Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Control with Green Stormwater Infrastructure (GSI) project. This precedent-setting project will reimagine a portion of the existing rights-of-way in the 1,111 acre basin to include, bioretention swales, street trees, amended soils and other green infrastructure facilities. These will be installed along approximately 32 blocks in the Sunrise Heights and Westwood neighborhoods with the goal of reducing overall stormwater loads to lower the incidence of combined sewer discharges.
A typical residential streetscape within the Barton Basin before undergoing the green stormwater infrastructure retrofit.
“Across the United States, cities are looking for cost-effective, environmentally-responsible solutions for reducing combined sewer overflows (CSOs) each year. At the same time, they are also looking for ways to reduce polluted stormwater runoff from their roadways. The Barton Basin project will accomplish both of these goals, providing an exceptional case study for making limited public funds go further,” said Peg Staeheli, ASLA, SvR’s Principal in Charge for the project. “King County could have spent one dollar and gotten one dollar’s worth in return; instead we’re getting three dollars back in return by creating jobs, adding real value to the neighborhood and increasing overall regional resilience.”
CSOs occur when existing combined sewer pipes are overwhelmed by heavy rain events, resulting in the release of sewage into local water bodies. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 850 billion gallons of untreated effluent come from CSOs every year. Washington State’s Department of Ecology estimates that CSOs account for 3.3 billion gallons of untreated discharge into the state’s waterways each year. In 2008, the Barton Basin had four overflows resulting in 4 million gallons of untreated effluent.
A typical residential streetscape within the Barton Basin after the green stormwater infrastructure retrofit with raingardens, street trees and swales added between the sidewalk and curb to help relieve pressure on the piped sewer system.
The Barton Basin project aims to reduce that number of overflows to one per year by controlling the rate at which stormwater flows into combined sewer pipes. By trapping and infiltrating this stormwater closer to where it falls, the Barton Basin project will reduce the amount of stormwater entering the combined pipe system, and reduce overall energy devoted to pumping and treatment.
“The conventional engineering approach to solving CSOs would have been to add a lot of storage capacity for pipes, vaults and other large concrete structures,” according to Steve Burke, PE, the project’s lead civil engineer. “That type of bottom-of-the-pipe solution solves the CSO problem, but it also misses an opportunity to bring a more holistic solution forward to the community. By contrast, the top-of-the-pipe, low impact development solutions that we’ll be implementing in Barton Basin will reduce the amount of water flowing into the piped sewer system, create green jobs, improve biological diversity, filter polluted stormwater runoff, increase walkability and accelerate adaptation to a wetter environment due to climate change, just to name a few of its many benefits.”
The project is expected to be designed in the next year and a half, with construction completed by 2015.
Posted August 8th, 2011 by Brice Maryman
Let’s Do This, a new education campaign, asks King County residents to get involved in creating healthier communities
Exciting changes are happening in King County to prevent tobacco- and obesity-related diseases, two leading causes of preventable death in King County.
Through a Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) grant, SvR is leading a team of consultants–Alta Planning and Design, CollinsWoerman and Urban Food Link–helping six King County cities consider ways to create healthier communities through improved food access, transportation and land use. The goal of these policy changes will be to make the healthy choice the easy choice. In this case, the healthy choice is known as HEAL: Healthy Eating and Active Living. These are policy-level interventions that will change communities, especially underserved neighborhoods by creating more healthy options and less unhealthy ones for hundreds of thousands of residents.
More than a third of the deaths in King County – about 4,000 each year — are a result of smoking, unhealthy eating and lack of physical activity. Persons in the most disadvantaged communities are three to four times more likely to be obese or smoke compared to the well-off neighborhoods.
To combat this trend, Public Health – Seattle & King County and more than 50 partners across the County are working to create sustainable community changes that increase access to physical activity and healthy food, decrease access to unhealthy food options, decrease tobacco use and limit exposure to secondhand smoke, particularly in areas where the need is greatest. The SvR team is working with the cities of Redmond, Snoqualmie, SeaTac, DesMoines, Burien and Federal Way to change zoning to allow more access to healthy food choices, to improve non-motorized transportation connections within and between these cities, to write Complete Streets ordinances and to better align land use code with public health goals.
Let’s Do This Campaign
Let’s Do This, the Public Health campaign that supports the on-going CPPW work, officially launches in early August. The campaign supports the ongoing Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CCPW) obesity and tobacco prevention efforts underway in King County.
As the Let’s Do This campaign explains, people can’t make healthy choices if they aren’t available. The campaign focuses on the relationship between neighborhood and health, notes inequities in our county and inspires residents to become involved. The campaign features Mia, an eleven-year-old King County resident who wants to be a healthy kid and notices aspects of her neighborhood that make it difficult to be healthy.
Let’s Do This materials include a 30-second cable television ad in English and Spanish, three on-line videos, online, radio and ethnic media advertising, posters, billboards and a website. For more information about the campaign, to download posters and to view additional videos about sugary drinks, safe walking routes to school, and healthy retail, visit www.letsdothiskingcounty.org.
You also can help spread the word about the campaign on Facebook and Twitter.
