Park design, trolley barn at odds

A prefab metal barn painted an industrial shade of taupe rises some 26 feet off the ground, a blight upon a landscape the Seattle Art Museum (SAM) wants to transform into the city's latest, greatest waterfront park.

From SAM's vantage point, the unattractive rectangular structure is in the way, smack in the middle of what otherwise would be a brilliant Puget Sound and mountain vista. It would be a given that the barn must go, but for one important factor: This is where Metro's waterfront streetcars are maintained and stored.

Without a facility to service the fleet, the beloved vintage trolley line would have to shut down. Replacing it, though, is an expensive and tricky proposition — not as simple as raising a tent and laying some new track.

As city and county officials try to figure out a means for both the streetcar line to be preserved and SAM to develop its Olympic Sculpture Park as originally designed, museum officials are hearing criticism from citizens who assume the barn can be prettied up and the park built around it.

In response, park supporters have been explaining why they don't believe the maintenance barn can be integrated logically into the design, and why the city should be overjoyed at the prospect of getting an unobstructed green space on the water's edge.

"This is the time for leadership to emerge to find a solution that will enable this incredible gift to the city to go forward," said John T. John, president of Graham & Dunn, a law firm with offices at Pier 70 that overlook the future site of the park.

"The park is a gift, really, when you think about all the private donations that have been raised to create a public space for everyone in the city to enjoy."

SAM has raised $66.5 million toward the $85 million park, which is scheduled to open in July 2006. About $15 million of the total has been raised from government sources, with the rest from corporations, foundations and individuals. The total includes a private endowment that would maintain the park in perpetuity.

SAM hopes to begin construction this fall where the barn now sits.

City and county officials, appreciating public support behind both the trolley and the sculpture park, will consider the conflict at a Regional Transit Committee meeting March 30.

8.5 acres

The 8.5-acre sculpture park would gently slope from Western Avenue to Elliott Bay, stretching two blocks north from Broad Street. The design includes two pedestrian bridges, one crossing Elliott Avenue and the other a 24.5-foot clearance over the Burlington Northern railroad tracks. The latter bridge, made of colored glass, would empty pedestrians along a strip of green space on the shoreline. The streetcar-maintenance barn and the two parking lots that surround it exist there now.

That 2.5-acre shoreline strip now also serves as an awkward confluence between Myrtle Edwards Park and the waterfront. One of the sculpture park's benefits is extending Myrtle Edwards' hike-and-bike path to create a safe and seamless passage to and from Alaskan Way, said Chris Rogers, SAM's director of capital projects.

Citizens have asked museum officials why they cannot build a bridge over the maintenance barn, or even build the park above the facility, like the lid over the Interstate 90 tunnel. But the barn, which sits between the railroad tracks and Elliott Bay, is 26 feet, 8 inches tall at its highest point, and it extends almost to the water's edge, making a bridge or lid impractical, if not impossible.

Citizens also have challenged the museum to be creative and treat the barn like a utilitarian sculpture. But SAM officials say the barn is devoid of artistic value. They also emphasize that leaving the barn standing would block views from the park as well as severely truncate the shoreline strip of green space, which includes a pocket beach.

Not extending the park to the waterfront "would be akin to building the Space Needle without its top," Rogers said.

Rather than focus on ideas for integrating the barn into the park, museum officials prefer to promote the park that they have envisioned since 1999: a series of expansive terraces featuring more than a dozen classic and contemporary sculptures set in a natural environment. It also would feature a cafe, an amphitheater and indoor pavilions housing art installations.

Alexander Calder's 39-foot-tall "Eagle," now displayed at SAM's Seattle Asian Art Museum in Volunteer Park, would be moved to the sculpture park. Calder, who died in 1976, is one the most acclaimed and influential steel sculptors of our day, his works displayed in plazas throughout the world.

SAM also has purchased a new steel sculpture by Richard Serra, a minimalist from New York whose works are displayed at some of the world's most prestigious museums.

The park design now is part of an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan, held up as an outstanding example of turning a reclaimed industrial site into a public space.

Streetcar line

SAM designed the park under the assumption that the maintenance barn would be replaced, based on assurances from city and county officials. But it did not assume that the streetcar service would have to be suspended as a result.

A 1999 museum fund-raising brochure, touting the project as "Seattle's last chance for a downtown park," includes a photo of a vintage streetcar, proclaiming that the trolley would provide transportation to the park.

The waterfront streetcar line, launched in 1981, runs from Pier 70 to the Chinatown International District, with stops near Pike Place Market and in Pioneer Square. It is particularly popular among tourists.

SAM director Mimi Gardner Gates has written an open letter on the museum's Web site (www.seattleartmuseum.org) that reiterates the museum's support for the streetcar: "SAM believes that like art, the streetcar enriches the experience and charm of our waterfront community," she wrote.

Its maintenance barn, however, lacks charm — and that's not its purpose.

Four of the fleet's five streetcars, which were built between 1925 and 1930, are stored and serviced every day at the 8,000-square-foot facility, while the fifth is refurbished at a Metro shop in Tukwila.

The cars, trimmed in mahogany and ash, need to be stored indoors when not in use, to shield them from weather-related corrosion, said Kevin Desmond, Metro's general manager. The building also shelters workers from the elements.

San Francisco's streetcars are serviced inside but stored outside. The city, though, is building a covered storage facility to better protect the cars, said Judy Riley, Metro's design and construction manager.

Platforms and pits

It is not the shell of the maintenance barn that makes replacing it expensive, but rather its guts.

Fundamental to the facility are its concrete platforms, thick enough to support heavy cranes that lift the streetcar off its wheels, a process necessary for maintenance. The barn also has two pits where workers inspect and adjust brakes from the underside, part of daily maintenance. Also fundamental is an overhead power-supply network, necessary because the cars run on electricity.

"The notion that we can build a quick-and-dirty fix is a fallacy," Desmond said. "Any temporary replacement still would have to be a substantial maintenance facility."

It would cost several million dollars, although Metro officials are reluctant to estimate because cost would depend on a number of factors, such as the price of the land. Riley said laying new track, also necessary for any replacement facility, is expensive at about $1,000 a linear foot.

"The farther we have to move it, the more track we have to lay, the greater the cost," she said.

SAM officials wonder whether a replacement barn could be built a couple blocks north, on the opposite side of the sculpture park. They say the streetcars could run beneath the same bridge as will the Burlington Northern trains.

Desmond, however, said that would put the replacement facility inside a different park, Myrtle Edwards, possibly raising issues unique to that park.

He also said the idea of transporting the 2.5-ton streetcars by truck every day to a maintenance facility off the line is too costly to be practical. Riley added that truck-hauling the streetcars every day also would be bad for the brittle fleet.

If a replacement facility is found somewhere else along the waterfront, it likely would be in service only until work begins on replacing the Alaskan Way Viaduct, Desmond said. The city has told him that utility-relocation work is scheduled to start in 2009, meaning the line would shut down and the life of a replacement facility would be about three years. That raises several questions about whether a temporary facility would be a worthwhile investment of public money.

Others think the streetcar has several more years to run along the waterfront before it is forced to shut down for viaduct reconstruction. Under their scenario, a temporary facility might be worth the price.

Stuart Eskenazi: 206-464-2293 or seskenazi@seattletimes.com