A Hike across the Pinehurst Plateau

Dear Diary,

From downtown Lake City I headed south along Lake City Way NE.  My first destination was a Natural Area on that road that, like Flicker Haven, gets ignored by mappers.  Like most Natural Areas in North Seattle, it's in a lowland, but as I learnt while working on the page about the South Fork of Thornton Creek, a page of "Land and Water" I haven't actually written in you yet, the land goes uphill from it not because of a hill, but because of an eastward salient, between the North and South Forks of Thornton Creek, of the plateau that dominates north-central Seattle.  This eastern mini-plateau is essentially what's under the Pinehurst neighbourhood, so, since I don't know it to have its own name, the choice is pretty obvious.

Oh, and although I got all that from a topographical map, in fact that walk Monday evening did entail going uphill, walking on the flat a long way, and then going downhill.  Score one for cartographers!

This is the least compact hike I've taken in this region, which is why the plateau is the only unifying thing I can think of.  Hubbard Homestead is relatively far from the other Northgate parks, Homewood Natural Area from the other Lake City ones, and the Pinehurst parks aren't all that close to anything.  This was, in other words, a real hike.

I took seventeen photos as I walked from that Natural Area to Hubbard Homestead north of Northgate, and Blogspot has apparently let me, this time, put them all in one page.

Map:

Homewood Natural Area

As I said, this one is ignored by the usual mappers - both Google Maps and Open Street Map just leave it blank (Open Street Map, which usually indicates woods, doesn't even do that there).  The Thornton Creek watershed map (PDF) includes it, though, and there's a Seattle city government page documenting a 2017 sweep (PDF), with lots of photos and a map.  Anyway, it's along the western side of Lake City Way about halfway down the block between NE 117th and 120th Streets.  It has one trail, which goes more or less straight down to the creek.

I haven't entirely ignored it, however; this is the only Natural Area in this region that I'd actually shown you pictures of already, dear Diary, in "Lake City Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us!" last November, a picture of its sign and a picture of the North Fork there.  So this time I confined myself to one more photo of the creek:

and took a few random landscape shots:

Since this is the last we'll see of the North Fork in this region's hikes, dear Diary, I feel obligated to note that I still haven't figured out one parks department property listed in the 2020 real property report:  "Thornton Creek - North Branch - Part Esmt", property #416, 6 1/4 acres, supposed address Lake City Way NE.  Now, the thing is, the South Fork does run along LCW for a while, but the North Fork just crosses the street, where Homewood Natural Area is.  I don't know whether this means the city owns 6 1/4 acres specifically of the creek bed from Licorice Fern Natural Area to Homewood, which would explain why so much of that creek is daylit, or what exactly, and none of the maps I use shows this ostensible park.

Pinehurst Pocket Park

My first visit to this park was near or at night, and I was much impressed, but you, dear Diary, weren't to know it; in "Top of the City", part I I just called it "very pleasant" and moved on right away, never to mention it again for months.  So I imagine you were pretty surprised when in "What's in a Name?" I called it out as a quarter-acre or less park that I would've regretted not seeing.  I was kind of surprised too.  So I wasn't sure what to expect on returning.

Well, it isn't the perfect park, and the art I mentioned isn't great art.  But it is an interesting place to rest a bit, with interesting things to look at, which is all I needed that evening, and all I would imagine any of your readers would need to justify a visit.  It's certainly the boutique park of this general area.

I remembered art in a kiosk, which this page attests wasn't a bogus memory, but didn't find the kiosk this time.  What I did see is a sort of inlay in the pavement, sadly dirty after days without rain, but even so more effective than this photo can be:

For a much better photo, see this page, which credits an artist named Sara Mall Johani.  Apparently the inlays are actually meant to enable kids' games.

Also largely for the kids, and apparently also by Johani, a rather exotic model tractor, which the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation page says is in memory of a man who used to drive a steam tractor around the neighbourhood as recently as the 1960s:

The pages I read also credit Johani with pillars I haven't yet noticed.

The park's actual focus, according to the signage on the spot, is not artistic but environmental, so for people uninterested in art, there's that, and here's a landscape in which such people may be able to spot features that didn't interest me:

I was also amused by this:

So all in all, it was a satisfying, if not earth-shaking, reunion.

Pinehurst Playground

This is the only park in this page with public-facing plumbing - a water fountain, which I've found running on every visit so far, including Monday's:

It also has a sanican:

which the city's map of hygiene services persists in falsely claiming is ADA-compliant, although I told the map's makers otherwise months ago:

I've shown you, dear Diary, non-plumbing photos of this park before, well anyway one or two, so this time I photographed the playground:

a grill in front of the baseball field:

and a miscellaneous landscape:

As usual when I've visited, the basketball half-court was too busy to photograph.  I'm starting to think half-courts are probably more common in North Seattle parks than either full courts, or the hoops alone that I thought the norm.

Pinehurst P-Patch

This P-Patch is on the more or less flat, thankfully:

but has somewhat confused signage:

Northgate Pump Station

This Seattle Public Utilities facility is a working one, is not one of their parks, and there's no public access inside the building, but they did put a sign out front, and also parkified the premises quite a bit, so I took one picture:

Note, though, Seattle City Light is, despite its do-gooding, much less of a public-facing landowner, and I would not photograph - have on my last hike not photographed - a Seattle City Light building closed to the public but with similarly parklike landscaping.

Hubbard Homestead

Way back in January, in "Hike 1A", part II, I promised this park, for services abundantly rendered, a full treatment.  But I reached it after sunset, which was hardly the ideal time to try to grok a park.  So I only took one photo as testimony that I hadn't forgotten the promise:

and in fact came back Wednesday.  So assuming I return OK from the errands I have planned for the next few hours, I hope to keep that promise tonight, as the second page I write in you about the Wednesday hikes, dear Diary.  Until then!

Top of the City, Part I

Dear Diary,

Exciting but old news for you, I'm afraid.  There are three more parks in northeastern Seattle with both open restrooms and running water fountains, but they're all really far away, and they've all been that way for weeks; I don't know of any newer examples.  So I think I've sort of found the northern boundary of the water fountain desert, but not the eastern boundary.

I visited all the parks between the water, the city limits, I-5, Lake City Way, and 110th St on the 14th and 15th, then re-visited those with restrooms and/or water fountains on the 26th and 27th.  This page covers the ten parks visited on the 14th and, where relevant, the 26th.  I ended up stopping at the same point in each hike, so tomorrow's page will cover the remaining four parks in the northernmost parts of Seattle's northeast.  Finally, Friday I'll talk about ten parks further south in the area.

Outlying Lake City

University Lake Shore Place

Visited only May 14.  (I had to get directions, because both my map and Google Maps make grievous errors around here.)  No plumbing.

Near as I can tell, this is simply a stretch of wooded slope over the Burke-Gilman Trail, just south of 125th St.  There's a bench, but it might belong to the trail rather than this, um, park.  Speaking as someone who's gone through the entire official list of parks, I'm extremely grateful Seattle doesn't own, and separately name, all the wooded slopes over the trail.

NE 130th Street End

Visited only May 14 (same set of directions).  No plumbing.

This is a tiny beach built for the kids of Lake City long ago.  Unfortunately it's now kind of hard for most of them to reach.  There's a stair from 42nd Ave, but 42nd is kind of a world unto itself, with no contact between it and the rest of Lake City between 123rd and 145th Streets.  So the beach is much easier to reach from outside Lake City, via the Burke-Gilman Trail.

Cedar Park

Visited May 14 and 26.  One water fountain, not running either time.

This is an elementary school's playground, on 135th St between 37th and 39th Avenues, open to the public as a park except during recesses.  It appears to work much better than the similar deal over Nathan Hale Playfield.  Most of the people present on my second, mid-afternoon, visit were of elementary school age.  It's basically a playground plus a grassy area, which turns out to be a common design.

Little Brook Park

Visited May 14 and 26.  One restroom, closed May 14, described to me as just reopened May 15, open May 26.  One water fountain, running May 14 but rather more strongly May 26.

Dear Diary, I didn't make a mistake there.  Little Brook Park (formerly known as Lake City Open Space, on 32nd Ave north of 140th St) doesn't have one men's room and one women's, or two all-gender, or two anything.  It has one restroom.  That room is lockable:

but unsurprisingly that deadbolt has been disabled:

This restroom's privacy issues don't end there.  It's ventilated by holes in the walls at top and bottom, and although it took me some work, I was able to take these pictures

of the then-closed room through a bottom hole.  A woman would have to be pretty desperate or pretty stupid to use this room.  I was uncomfortable using it myself yesterday.

The rest of the park seems to be playground plus grassy area, but I didn't look for the namesake creek in or beyond the grass.

Downtown Lake City

Albert Davis Park

Visited May 14th and 26th.  One water fountain, not running either time.

This is a small park sandwiched between the Lake City Community Center (in which I detected no signs of life) and the Lake City branch library.  On my first visit, it was dominated by an encampment of my peers, concentrated on the south side of the park; I saw mostly black people there.  Yesterday the tents were much more spread out (socially distanced) and I saw some white people as well as blacks.  The camp is equipped with two "sanicans" and a hand-washing station.

Lake City Mini Park

Visited May 14 and 26; no plumbing.

This is a sliver of land which on the 14th was dominated by an encampment in which I saw mostly white people.  Yesterday, though it was still crowded with tents, I thought it shrunken, but saw some black people among the whites.  This camp also has two "sanicans" and a hand-washing station.

I talked with one gentleman living there May 14.  He called Little Brook's working water fountain a "treasure" but admitted that the camp's main source of water (or at least his own) was neighbours' outdoor taps.

I want to emphasise this to you, dear Diary.  I often praise our wonderful mayor, but this may well be her masterstroke.  By leaving two water fountains turned off, she simultaneously saves the city money, and converts any number of private citizens into benefactors.  Isn't that heartwarming?

Lake City Memorial Triangle

Visited May 14 and briefly May 26; no plumbing.

If I've correctly identified this, it's a small triangle in front of some buildings, across the street from the previous park.  It's supposedly a memorial for some specific young men who died of violence, but I haven't found any plaques.  It's dominated instead by a gigantic ad for a bank, a very big ad for a VA clinic, and a big ad for a restaurant.

Virgil Flaim Park

Visited May 14 and 26; at least one water fountain, not running either time.

Yes, in case you've been keeping count, that's the other water fountain in downtown Lake City that our wise mayor is keeping off.  This park, probably bigger than the other three downtown parks put together, southwest of them, is largely grassy but includes, besides the playground, a skatepark.  I saw no tents, but many of the vehicles parked near there on the 14th, and some on the 26th, looked inhabited.

There's lots of room at this park for the restrooms Lake City ought to have, which won't fit at Little Brook.

Pinehurst

Pinehurst Pocket Park

Visited May 14; no plumbing.

This is a very pleasant park the size of a one-house lot, with various pieces of art.  It's at the corner of 117th St and 19th Ave.

Pinehurst Playfield

Visited May 14 and 26; one water fountain at least, running both times.

This park, on 14th Ave north of 120th St, isn't small, but because it's very steeply sloped, it doesn't feel as big as it actually is.  Besides the requisite baseball diamond it has a basketball half-court, a shelter house (which I doubt has ever included restrooms), and I don't know what-all else.  The water fountain gives good water.  This is where I spent yesterday evening.

I spent the nights of the 14th and 26th in the same bus shelter.

All for today (well, technically yesterday now), dear Diary.  Fewer parks, in more detail, tomorrow.