Looking out over Bellingham Bay, a
popular waterfront park bustles with activity. Everywhere you look, people are
playing, running, biking or relaxing—and they are all maneuvering around the
large, fenced-off center of Boulevard Park.
In mid-April, a three-month construction
project began to replace two failing sewer pumps at Boulevard Park according to
the City of Bellingham Public Works project website. The project requires
excavation and removal procedures according to the website. As a result, a long
strip of the park from the outdoor stage down to the Woods Coffee has been
fenced off.
On one side of the fence, next to the
parking lot, Boulevard Park’s only playground sits in an alcove, surrounded by
construction.
“If they have to do it, we just have to
work with it,” Joni Park said, watching her grandchildren run around on the playground.
She said she commutes from out in the county to come to Boulevard Park with her
family. She is one of many inconvenienced by the construction but by not enough
to avoid the park.
“If they had a gate to get through,”
Park said, “it’d make it a little bit more convenient to get to the beach from
this little playground.”
The only way to get to Boulevard’s
waterfront side is to walk to the ends of the park and around the fenced area.
Park said she hoped parents and children would be on one side at the same time
in case anyone got hurt because it would take too long to get around the fence
to someone.
The construction area has cut through a
large portion of Boulevard’s grassy, open space and the view from either side of
the fence has been obstructed. Children’s games of soccer and Frisbee have been
pushed out to edges of the park to the remaining open areas that sit between
trees and on the shoreline.
Even with the lack of a large open
space, Boulevard Park still remains one of Bellingham’s most popular
destinations. Project signs posted around the park boast of around 500,000
yearly visitors.
“This community is so amazing,” another
park-goer, Jane Montague said. Montague grew up on the East Coast before moving
to Bellingham. “There are a lot of parks and a lot of water access here,” Montague
said. She said she believes that it is very important to have parks because
kids need a place to play and climb around.
“When you know why it has to be, it’s a
good cause,” Montague said. She said she agrees that the replacement of the
sewer pumps is a necessary inconvenience.
This rehabilitation project will “insure
the serviceability and reliability of the wastewater systems for current and
future park visitors,” explains on of the city’s information signs posted in
the park.
A group of students practicing on a
slack line tied between two trees said they wished there could be a year
without construction.
“It’s lame because it’s this, this year
and the beach last year,” Mel Vautaux said. She explained that she and her
friends come to Boulevard often and it seems like there has been constant
construction.
This is the second major project that
has occurred in the last few years. In 2013, construction on the shoreline
began in order to minimize erosion and to create beach access according to the
City of Bellingham’s project website. Landscaping that lasted into 2014 make
this the third year in a row that park access has been limited.
Another one of the students, Derek
Smith said the construction “definitely makes the park feel smaller and you
can’t look straight out to the water.”
Even with the disruption, on a sunny
day, people flock to the park and manage to work around the construction. On
Saturday, Apr. 25, high school students on their way to prom wandered around
the park. Avoiding the construction, they made the walk around the fence in
dress shoes and high heels and snapped pictures in front of the sunset over the
bay.
________________________________________________________________________
Boulevard Park Sewer Improvements
http://www.cob.org/government/departments/pw/projects/boulevard-park-sewer-eu-0176.aspx
Boulevard Park Shoreline Improvements
http://www.cob.org/government/departments/parks/projects/boulevard-park-shoreline-improvements.aspx
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