Under Construction, part VII: Woodland Park Before, During and After

Dear Diary,

As the title of this part implies, Woodland Park, a gigantic park in southern mid-North Seattle, has three projects listed at the two websites on which this page is based:  One done in 2025; one visibly still going; and one not yet started.

Citywide Athletics Building Restoration

You may remember, dear Diary, that thanks to a fire, the restrooms in the park's southeast corner closed.

Well, in 2025, the building got fixed.  I couldn't find any sign in the Internet Archive that the project was ever listed as upcoming - if I'd been paying attention in 2025, I'd have called this a "cowboy" project.  But on the chance that it's reasonable to think of the building as new, I took a postcard shot:

Replacing the turf on Field 1

Synthetic turf wears out, so it needs replacement every so often, as I remarked in part II of this page.

Now, Woodland Park, being so big, has basically five parts.  1) It has the city's main zoo, which dominates the park's western half, and which charges admission, one reason I've never visited.  2) South of the zoo is a big rose garden, and although roses don't excite me all that much, this garden is actually a pretty neat place, and does not charge admission.  3) In the park's northwestern corner, Woodland Park poses as an ordinary neighbourhood park, with one water fountain which I haven't visited yet this year.

The larger eastern half of the park is divided by use and by a strong gradient into the lower, eastern half, and the upper, western half.  The name "Lower Woodland Park" applies to both of these halves, because the zoo is even higher up.

4) The west has several picnic shelters, and my description of how homeless campers used these shelters in the height of the pandemic has, strangely, become one of your most popular pages, dear Diary.  This 4th part of Woodland Park also has reasonable woods to get lost in.

But all three of these projects are in Woodland Park's third claim to fame, besides the zoo and rose garden, which is 5) its unusual aggregation of athletic playfields in its lowest, easternmost, part.  Each of these fields is numbered, and the southernmost, Field 1, has been specifically blest by the Seattle Mariners, and so Seattle's Department of Parks and Recreation keeps Field 1 locked up, the way a housekeeper might lock up the best china after a U.S. president had eaten from it.  Which makes it really hard for a visitor, usually arriving late in the day, and ignorant about synthetic turf, to tell when a project is going on.  I mean, Field 1 is always fenced off anyway.

But I finally decided that this photo demonstrates that the work isn't done, so this is a "during" account:

Installing turf in the infield of Field 4

Because Field 1 is so special, Woodland Park has to have a different, regular baseball diamond, for everyday use.  And because it's hypertrophic Woodland Park, it actually has four of these, Fields 3 through 6, in an arrangement formally named "Cloverleaf".  Now, I haven't investigated the other three - bad journalist, no cookie - but Field 4's infield is sand, for which the baseball technical term appears to be "grass".  So they're replacing that infield with turf, replacing "grass" without actually tearing up any plant life, so that players can use it during the many months of rain Seattle gets.

Well, two days ago I was there, and it's still all sand.  Just as I showed you, dear Diary, in part II of this page.

Neither of my photos of the construction signs shows a contractor's name.  Perhaps it's the same contractor for both jobs, and Field 4 will start when Field 1 is done.  Or maybe it seemed more reasonable to close Field 1 for a summer when it gets less use anyway, but Field 4, well, I haven't yet found it empty.  The project page hasn't been updated since March.  We'll see, I guess, dear Diary.

It's going to take me one more day to plan the baseline hikes, so there probably won't be any new parts to this page for a few days.  But tomorrow I hope to tell you, dear Diary, about a book about hiking I recently read, and about who owns the streets of Seattle.  Until then, stay happy, dear Diary.