Some explanations and links concerning the water fountain situation

Dear Diary,

I don't intend to have very much to write in you this month, during which I have to concentrate on other aspects of my life.  But it came to my attention today that I have no more permission to put Web links into my comments here than anywhere else.  Also, yesterday, I gave away my key to the water fountain mystery to two of your readers, and it seems unfair not to tell everyone else.  So here's a page of links and explanations.

This is Year Two of the Durkan Drought.  There's an important difference between the drought of last year, roughly March to July, and the drought of this year.  Last year, the few public water fountains that ran were scattered in well-defined segments of North Seattle.  There was a cluster in Ballard, a cluster in the far north of North Seattle, and a small cluster in the southeast of North Seattle, plus one in Wallingford and two in Green Lake that were easiest to explain as local phenomena.

• Ballard:  Sunset Place, Gilman Playground, Ballard Commons
• Northeast:  Little Brook Park, Pinehurst Playground, Jackson Park, Northacres Park, and arguably Licton Springs Park
  
• Southeast:  Burke-Gilman Playground Park, Ravenna Park, street fountain near UW
• Central:  street fountain in Wallingford; fountains of the Green Lake Park Small Craft Center.

I think this happened because three different plumbers were turning them on when the shutdown happened, and were working in the first three areas.  Street fountains normally stayed on most of each winter, explaining those two.  And I figured the Green Lake SCC folks just left a nice present for the city behind when they closed up.

I could, of course, be wrong, but anyway it's possible to understand the first year of the Durkan Drought as more or less accidental.  Not this year.  Here's the list:

• Ballard:  Sunset Place, Gilman Playground, Ballard Commons
• Far north:  Virgil Flaim Park, Pinehurst Playground, Jackson Park, Bitter Lake Playfield, and arguably Licton Springs Park and Greenwood Park
  
• Southeast:  Burke-Gilman Trail and University Playground

So obviously, there are fewer fountains, period.  But beyond that, they're slightly better spread out, and there's one more thing I can't believe I'm the only one who's noticed:

Far fewer running water fountains, at least in North Seattle, are in parks that have open restrooms, this year as against last year.

Two of the parks that are on both lists had open restrooms last year, but not this year:  Gilman Playground and Licton Springs Park.

One park on both lists is privately managed (and has had open restrooms and running water fountains throughout the pandemic):  Jackson Park.

Otherwise?  Last year, fountains ran in these parks with restrooms:  

• Little Brook Park
• Northacres Park
• Burke-Gilman Playground Park
• Ravenna Park
• Green Lake Park
• and Ballard Commons if you consider the Portland Loo a restroom

This year?

• Bitter Lake Playfield
• Greenwood Park
• and Ballard Commons if you consider the Portland Loo a restroom

So seven or eight publicly managed parks in North Seattle offered both water fountains and restrooms last year; this year, two or three do.  North Seattle has somewhere between a quarter and a third of the city's parks, so it isn't hard to extrapolate, and the result is pretty grim.

Statistically competent people may be able to estimate the probability of such a switch being random chance, but I'm pretty sure that probability is close to zero.

I'll leave my ideas as to explanations for later pages and now concentrate on links.

It looks like I misremembered the city's excuse for not turning on drinking fountains, and therefore articulated, in my comment earlier this afternoon, a disagreement between me and Erica C. Barnett of PubliCola that doesn't actually exist.  The city's excuse is enunciated in this uncredited article by Barnett:  they read the CDC's rules as requiring them to clean water fountains between each use, which is obviously impractical.  The actual CDC rules say nothing of the sort, nor does a more explicit CDC document; the first link says they need cleaning daily, which is the same reading Barnett came up with.  I'm sure if the city actually felt the need to defend its position, it would fall back to claiming that cleaning the fountains daily is too hard, which is the question I'm currently getting ready to work on.

I haven't been in touch with the city since I called (with your help, dear Diary) this city product for the homeless a pack of lies, so all I have to go by is what I see and what I read.

Concerned citizens other than me may wish to contact the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation, which is, obviously, in charge of water fountains in the parks, with the possible exception of two water fountains on the Burke-Gilman Trail.

Those two fountains strongly resemble street fountains scattered around the city, responsibility for which isn't public, although I'm getting the impression that Seattle Public Utilities may be the agency to blame for the street fountains' steady decay in recent years.

 

I never contacted SPU to write you, dear Diary, but I used to talk with the parks department, and their contact page is where I started and where others who wish to complain should start.