Downtown Tacoma's Rain Garden Plan
You may or may not have noticed a little side conversation going on yesterday about the functionality of the rain gardens planned as a part of the Pacific Avenue Streetscape Project. Well, we noticed, and we were pleased to see a great article from The News Tribune’s Kathleen Cooper. Questions had been raised about the appropriateness of the gardens for downtown streets, and in her response Cooper digs into the details of the gardens planned for Pacific Avenue. If you’re at all curious or concerned about how the gardens will work, what they’ll look like, and where else they’ve been tried, this is a good read.
We’re frankly excited to see such attractive and smart elements included in the new look for Pacific Avenue, but it’s also good to know that the City’s done their homework on such a significant investment of public funds. Will it work as planned?
2 comments
M Michael November 20, 2011
I’m with Exit 133 on this — the rain garden will be attractive, functional, and economical. The criticism of the idea, especially when based on the failure of a poorly designed rain garden in one particular instance (the Ballard example) is a red herring.
M Mofo from the Hood November 22, 2011
Here again is another example of the City of Tacoma using public funds to conduct experiments for no apparent reason.
Likewise this new thoroughfare narrowing episode is nothing but exasperating to anybody with a notion to conduct business in a timely manner with regards to travel and distribution of goods and services.