A new regional park is being created in Seattle, and it's not the Olmstead legacy of Jefferson Park, the wonders of Magnolia's Discovery Park, or the Capitol Hill community's Volunteer Park.
Dr. Jose Rizal Park is about to become a gateway to Beacon Hill, the International District, downtown, and Seattle's waterfront.
To understand what these 8 acres on the tip of Beacon Hill will be is to know Dr. Jose Rizal, a man of medicine, of letters, of peace. If he had served today, in our more media conscious age, Rizal would be as familiar as Martin Luther King Jr., Cesar Chavez, Sun Yat Sen, and Mahatma Gandhi.
In the 19th Century, colonial Spain subjugated the Philippines to virtual slavery. A small middle class of native Filipinos arose, and though quality education was denied in their own land, opportunity existed abroad.
Rizal received medical training in Spain, thriving with expatriate intellectuals. In novels and essays, he argued forcibly for freedom for the Philippines. In 1889, he wrote "Sobre la Nueva Ortografia de la Lengua Tagala" at a time when works in Tagalog, the Filipino language, were banned. He believed his native tongue was the soul of his people.
Rizal maintained that violent revolution would ultimately fail. He was executed by a firing squad for his beliefs, dying in Bagumbayan, Manila on December 30, 1896. After his execution, Filipinos called for a revolution against Spain. It would have succeeded save for an American fleet appearing in Manila Harbor during an action in the Spanish-American War. A new empire had arrived, cast off eventually by Corazon Aquino.
To honor the Filipino community's contribution to Seattle, the city named this park in his memory. A bust of Rizal looks over the amphitheatre in the park, reminding us of the best we can be. That gaze has seen much change in our city's life and now another change is in sight.
The missing link of the Mountain to Sound Greenway Trail is about to be completed with construction beginning in 2006. The trail will sweep from 14th Avenue South, through the lower park, across and over the I-5 and I-90 interchange tangle, descend to Royal Brougham and Puget Sound.
Many made this route possible.
In 1993, the Seattle Rotary Club, the Weyerhaeuser Company, and the Mountain to Sound Greenway Trust began a reforestation project: the cedars they planted are now firmly established.
In 1998, the Beacon Alliance of Neighbors formed to address public safety for the community around the park and Northwest Beacon Hill.
In 2000, the Kingdome blew up. Thousands of people descended on the lower park to witness the event, establishing paths.
In 2001, Citizens for Off Leash Areas worked with neighbors to create a dog park for the broader community.
In 2002, the City of Seattle's Neighborhood Action Team engaged citizens along with city, county, and state agencies to make the area safe. Their efforts opened "the jungle," Seattle's last untamed forest, for conservation and the public while clamping down on some notorious drug-related criminal activity.
In 2005, the Beacon Alliance of Neighbors sponsored $165,000 in grants to open the forest to people and to preserve it for the 45 species of birds that roost in its trees and live and fly in it.
Seventy volunteers from Americorps, Starbucks, Seattle University, and the community joined with Seattle Parks and Recreation crews on Saturday, April 9, to save trees from ivy, clean the eastern and southern slopes, and prepare the way for the park that will be.
In just a couple of years, thousands of commuters will bicycle daily to work from Seattle's South End and the Eastside through the park. Fans will bike to Mariners' games. Development spawned by light rail - like the Frye project planned just south of the International District - will make the park an urban forest destination.
Our neighborhood traditions will continue. People will gather to cheer as New Year's Eve and Fourth of July fireworks celebrate the sky. The coyotes and raccoons that live in the Jungle will prowl our nights, pad softly around our dreams.
On April 19, the Beacon Alliance of Neighbors will sponsor an open house on the future of Dr. Jose Rizal Park, the jungle, and the Mountain to Sound Trail, at 7 p.m. at Quarters 1, at the corner of 14th Avenue South and South Judkins Street.
All are invited to attend in the spirit of Dr. Rizal to help make this park a place to celebrate weddings, culture, friendship, or a moment beneath the maples moving in the breeze, a tribute to his living memory.
Craig Thompson may be reached at editor@sdistrictjournal.com
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