Dear Diary,
Some time ago I acquired a list of Seattle parks. This list is said to list the parks with restrooms that can't stand up to the winter. There are ten in North Seattle:
- Burke-Gilman Playground Park
- Cowen Park
- Greenwood Park
- Little Brook Park
- Meadowbrook Playfield
- Meridian Playground
- Ravenna Park
- Ross Playground
- Soundview Playfield
- Woodland Park
In Ravenna Park, the "upper" restrooms are meant. In Woodland Park, I'm not sure whether the "Cloverleaf" or "lawn bowling" restrooms are meant.
Since Greenwood and Little Brook Parks each have only one restroom, this is 18 restrooms closed because they weren't built for winter.
In addition, two parks - Magnuson and Woodland - have restrooms that had to be closed this past winter because of vandalism. They are Magnuson's "Tower" restrooms and Woodland's "Rio". This gets us to 22 restrooms that had to close. One might wish to add the boarded-up restroom at Matthews Beach to this list, but in fact there's been no announcement as to why it's boarded up, so I won't add it.
Notice that two restroom pairs on that list - Ross Park and Soundview Playfield - were open yesterday, and Meadowbrook Playfield's were advertised as open. Considering that we got down into the 30s Fahrenheit last night, and the National Weather Service predicts several more such nights to come, this suggests that some of these could have been open much of the winter. So does the fact that all of Woodland Park's restrooms except "Rio" were in fact open this winter, which means we're down to 20 restrooms that had to close anyway.
Restrooms that were closed this winter but aren't on that list were closed because of "historic low usage". In several cases it was reasonable to infer usage this winter from past years; in others, either because of changed circumstances in general or because of homeless campers specifically, it was not reasonable.
- Ballard Community Center
- Bitter Lake Playfield
- Gilman Playground
- Licton Springs Park
- Loyal Heights Community Center
- Magnuson Park
- Matthews Beach
- Northacres Park
- Salmon Bay Park
- Sandel Playground
- University Playground
Bitter Lake, Gilman, Licton Springs, Sandel and University all had campers. Ballard, Bitter Lake, Gilman, either Licton Springs or Sandel, either Loyal Heights or Salmon Bay, Matthews, and University would have filled significant geographic gaps. Magnuson Park normally has many restrooms available inside public buildings that are closed; both its "sport" restrooms and those built into the "Brig" should have been open this winter. Note also the winter-ready water fountains at Northacres Park shut off by the shutoff of water to the park-side restroom building.
At any rate, that's 24 restrooms (two pairs at Magnuson) that could have been open but weren't. (People who trust that there's a good reason for the boarded-up restroom at Matthews Beach should say 23.)
Why weren't they open? Well, the parks maintenance staff have several important things to do in winter with the time they aren't spending on opening, cleaning, supplying and closing restrooms. That's when they tend the playfields, try to restore damaged lawns, and above all remove graffiti. We all know that graffiti is much more dangerous than hygiene problems, don't we?
Anyway, they still were opening, cleaning, supplying and closing a bunch of restrooms:
- Dahl Playfield
- Golden Gardens Park
- Green Lake Park
- Laurelhurst Playfield
- Magnuson Park
- Maple Leaf Reservoir Park
- Northacres Park
- Ravenna Park
- Wallingford Playfield
- Woodland Park
The number is even greater because at Golden Gardens two pairs of restrooms were involved, at Green Lake two or three, and at Woodland two to four. Conservatively, let's call this 28 restrooms.
In addition, they cleaned and supplied an amazing number of restrooms that they didn't open or close, that stayed open 24 hours:
- Carkeek Park
- Gas Works Park
- Green Lake Park
- View Ridge Playfield
- Woodland Park
In Green Lake, there were usually two pairs, also in Woodland, though less reliably. Still, call this 14 restrooms, an astonishing 1/3 of those that were open at all.
How does this compare to winter 2019-2020? Fewer restrooms were open: the openings of Woodland Park's "lawn bowling" and "Cloverleaf" pairs didn't outweigh the closings of "Rio", Loyal Heights Community Center, Matthews Beach, and intermittently Green Lake Community Center. More were open 24 hours: certainly Gas Works and probably Woodland; I'm not sure about Carkeek.
In North Seattle, the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation's default response to the winter of 2020-2021 was to ignore the pandemic. Give them full credit for helping the campers at Woodland Park, but note that they didn't help those at Gilman or University Playgrounds or Bitter Lake Playfield. And don't even ask how they treated the general public at Magnuson Park.
It's probably a passing grade, but not a good one.
Good day, dear Diary. Tonight back to the January hikes.
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