Task Force Opportunities

Thanks to Judy Dorn for providing the following information regarding the following opportunities for any interested people to participate in improving the neighborhood.

Call 202-1779 to sign up for one or more of the following task forces:

1. to help keep progress going on making University Boulevard look better
2. to help plan signs and markers for the Lake George Neighborhood
3. to work on streetscape and street furniture throughout the neighborhood, using the ideas generated during our neighborhood meeting in February 2008

Photo 1 – University & 16th

University Boulevard

City Planning, Engineering, and Parks will help us launch the long-term process of beautifying University Boulevard. We will begin by filling in the biggest spaces first.

Benton County Master Gardener Keri Siedegren will hold a meeting in mid June to discuss what to do with the empty lots on the NE corner of Washington Memorial Drive & University Blvd, on the NE corner of 16th Ave S., and on the NW corner of 16th Ave and University Blvd.

Ideas collected so far:

• use evergreen trees as a background, and to help screen the neighborhood from the traffic; Parks can donate some Black Hills Spruce and crab apples
• plant a variety of evergreen and colorful or flowering trees, shrubs, and other strong plants all along University Blvd in order to prevent diseases from spreading (which happens when too many of one thing are planted)

East corner of Washington Memorial/Univ Blvd:

• Location of sign will need to be planned by task force 2, so we can plant around it
• City is likely to install a water hookup by 2009 or earlier, so we could plant flowers or annuals in a plot next to our new sign
• We will begin planting a variety of trees & shrubs in Fall 2008 and keep filling in our overall design over time.

East corner of 16th Ave S/Univ Blvd:

• We could install street furniture or public art on this site
• If we want to put in a water hook-up, we will need to make that decision and bring it to the City for eventual installation.
• Plenty of room to plant a variety of trees and shrubs. Our goal will be LOW MAINTENANCE plantings, drought and salt tolerant.

Let us know if you have concerns or questions about these projects.

Photo 2 – University Dr. & Washington Memorial Dr.

Signs and Markers

During Summer 2008, we will need to plan where to place the neighborhood marker on the corner of Washington Memorial Drive and University Blvd so that trees can be planted this Fall.
Here is the approach to our neighborhood on Washington Memorial. Shouldn’t we place the sign between the stoplight post and the electric box, so drivers coming in can see it?

Photo 3 is the approach to the corner from the East, heading towards Coborn’s. It looks like the sign should jut out beyond the electrical box. Perhaps it should have 2 faces—one for people going West, and one for people entering by Washington Memorial or turning in from Univ Blvd going in the other direction (photo 4) . Notice that there are a lot of things in this lot – two trees, a light post, electric box, and fire hydrant. We will also need to work with a designer on the look of the sign, and so set style for the rest of the neighborhood.

Photo 3 – Future signed neighborhood entry site

Photo 4 – Future signed neighborhood entry site – another view

Streetscape, street furniture

Lots of ideas about how to add interest to the look of our streets were gathered during the February 2008 annual neighborhood meeting. We need a group of people interested in moving forward with these ideas and making something happen, with City help.

garbage

Neighbors came out this morning to pick up garbage on the streets and sidewalks in our little corner of the world.

As we walked to lake George this morning it looked like we were going to have lots and lots of new volunteers. It turned out, however, that a bunch of folks were simply lining the streets to cheer on friends and family running in the Earth Day half marathon.

I don’t know any participation numbers for the clean-up yet, but quite a bit of trash was removed from public view. Thanks to everybody who participated.

Trash was dropped off at two different sites.

Volunteers at Lake George following the clean up