Restore Community

  Schmitz Park is indeed a rare and unique gem amongst other parks and public areas in the entire Seattle and Salish Sea area. Schmitz Park and its forested environs comprise 53 acres of largely undisturbed native Pacific Northwest forest and watercourse, Schmitz Park closely resembles the famous rain forests of Olympic National Park but it thrives in the middle of the major metropolitan area that is Seattle. Like Olympic National Park, Schmitz Park is a slice of undisturbed nature, persisting in wildness, yet bounded on all sides by development. Those who are fortunate enough to visit Schmitz Park and its ravine recognize immediately that they have discovered a true gem of nature and of Seattle’s Park system. The Schmitz Park ravine is unique in its size, depth, and protected northwesterly orientation. Artesian springs provide a permanent source of clean water. The stream once flowed undisturbed all the way to Alki Beach. It currently reaches the edge of the Park and then disappears into a storm drain. Schmitz Park Creek Restore seeks to save and preserve this centuries-old natural, regional and national treasure. Once the Park is restored and its creek reconnected to the Salish Sea it will serve to remind all visitors and observers of the beauty and fragility of the natural environment that once covered this entire region. It will also highlight the miracle of human action to preserve and restore what could have been lost.

Schmitz Park and its forested ravine and creek have long been both a pathway and a source of food, plant materials and spiritual peace. Indigenous settlements lined the Alki Peninsula, an area blessed with abundance and strategic location. As an area long revered by indigenous residents and early settlers from outside, Schmitz Park was set aside by founding members of one of Seattle’s first churches, Alki Congregational. The gift preserved this remarkable place at a time when both religious and secular thought prioritized “returning to nature” as a path to religious, spiritual and corporeal healing and health following the ravages of Civil Way and industrial revolution. Alki Congregational and several churches with historical or spiritual ties to that movement and this area have expressed strong interest being part of Schmitz Park Creek Restore.

The setting aside of Schmitz Park occurred when Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir, the Olmsted Brothers and others visited Seattle and encouraged such preservation. Schmitz Park’s donation and protection was the direct result of this movement. As modern Seattle came of age the gift of Schmitz Park and development of other parks in the City played a key role in building Seattle’s “green” reputation. Restoring a natural corridor to Alki Beach and its fish, forest, creek and cove will fulfill the vision and bequest of these donors and visionaries, including the Schmitz family and the Olmsted Brothers. Involvement of communities of faith, environmental and educational organizations and other diverse communities with ties to the area will help achieve an important part of that original vision and current sensibilities. 

  Schmitz Park Creek Restore plans to being laying groundwork now to seek national historic recognition of the Alki Area. The history of the Alki area is as remarkable and unique as the modern city that arose from this history. The Project will explore seeking such recognition and preservation and restoration to as part of its core mission. In this regard, Schmitz Park Creek Restore has been aided by the powerful groundwork in local history already laid down by the Southwest Seattle Historical Society, who will be an invaluable partner in such an effort. 

Seattle bears the name of the visionary indigenous leader who helped foster the growth and cooperation that built the City. The story of Chief Seattle and the tribes he represented deserves to be nationally recognized. So, too, does the story of Alki, its new settlers, and the welcome they received. The fine work in the recent biography, CHIEF SEATTLE, by David M. Buerge, makes a great starting point for seeking national park recognition of this historic land. Schmitz Park is a living remnant of those times. Schmitz Park survived because a community came together to protect it as accessible, undisturbed nature. Our story will be about a community that reunites to restore and protect undisturbed nature, ancient forest, at the center of our lives. These are stories worth preserving. As we go forward together to address climate change, Schmitz Park would be a terrific green center of a new national historic park honoring nature preserved, and the American spirit and human history that pervades Alki to this day. With solid community effort the Park can revive and do so for generations to come. This Project can beautifully fulfill and celebrate the intent of all those who have protected and celebrated its fish, forest, creek and cove for centuries: 

Schmitz Park Creek Restore. 

  A Restored Schmitz Park will become a natural, relaxed, accessible center point of education for all. Educational installation will be on ready display for all visitors about the wisdom of the gift that honors and preserves the natural abundance and persistence of the Schmitz Park area. Schools and institutions, nearby and throughout the region, will benefit from the lessons the Park teaches as a living remnant of ancient times and an open air museum. The Park will highlight geologic, biological and pre-human history. It will honor indigenous life over centuries, and developments since the first European settlements in 1851. Restoration will allow the observation of entire life cycles of the flora and fauna of the area and the importance of preserving these cycles in human dominated surroundings. Walkways, viewpoints and wayfinding will give guidance for present and future generations and allow visitors to find their way in environmentally friendly ways to and through the Park, and to other nearby attractions. 

This Project will include building an informative trail from the new Cove beginning near the Bathhouse at Alki Beach. The trail will then follow the restored Creek’s course through existing public lands and right-of-ways and pass near schools and community center and parallel the Creek through the Emma Schmitz Corridor to the Admiral Bridge, an art deco classic built by the WPA in 1936, and to planned artistic installations there. Beyond the Bridge, rationalized trails will guide visitors into the forested depths of Schmitz Park and its natural highlights, and exit near the current Schmitz Park School and at  one other access point at the Park’s southern border.

Further enhancements of the Schmitz Park complex are under discussion. The historic Stone Cottage is expected to find a new home along the route as a welcoming center for visitors. Creating a tie to the Mountain to Sound Greenway Project is under discussion. Local artists are working on plans to make the Admiral Way Bridge (a 1936 Art Deco Structure built by the WPA) an artistic centerpiece of Schmitz Park. Murals and other works of art will replace graffiti and tagging on the Bridge and celebrate the site. Consistent with the Olmsted Brothers Plans, the Schmitz Park trail corridor will naturally restore travel from the Bathhouse at historic Alki Beach to the ancient forests beyond around Alki Point and back to the Alki Landing site: a Pacific Northwest promenade, created by and enveloping its diverse community, in the true spirit of Alki.

  The Schmitz Park forest is one of few such undisturbed stands in the entire Salish Sea/Puget Sound basin. This unique forest includes ancient native Western Red Cedar, Douglas Fir, Western Hemlock, Grand Fir, Big Leaf Maple, Western Red Alder, Pacific Yew, Cascara, and Madrona trees. At least two large California Redwoods also thrive there. The upper story of Schmitz Park provides food and shelter for numerous bird species and other forms of life. The understory of the Schmitz Park Forest remains largely intact and shelters birds and mammals, including (historically at least) foxes and coyotes. The understory includes many native bushes and plants, trilliums and fawn lilies, skunk cabbage, oso plum, ocean spray and goatsbeard. It also includes evergreen huckleberry, red huckleberry, salmonberry, thimbleberry, service berry and salal. There are rare species of numerous ferns in natural settings including, sword, licorice, deer and maiden hair ferns. There are ancient mosses, fungi and mycelia. Such plant and animal life is rarely seen in urban settings.

Schmitz Park’s other major asset is that it features a sizeable creek that appears to be almost exclusively created by artesian springs arising in the upper (most southerly) portions of the park, probably sourcing from groundwater flowing down through the glacial till from which the Schmitz Park valley has been eroded. There are three major branches of the creek and several smaller creeks that contribute to the flow. All of the sources of the main creek appear to arise in forested areas and to have little or none of their flow coming from surface water outside the creek boundaries. The stream bed is largely intact and undisturbed for much of its length until it reaches the Park boundary where the creek water is diverted into a drain that appears to divide the flow in two directions and to mix it with storm water that then is discharged out into Elliot Bay.  

  Many of those who have joined early on in this effort are neighbors and friends of Schmitz Park and the Alki Beach community. Many of us have years of experience exploring and enjoying the Park and its history and surrounding areas and the many wonders detailed and pictured here. Others have discovered the Park only recently and been swept along by its unique environment and history. All share a common desire to see the Park flourish and survive as envisioned and celebrated for centuries by the area’s indigenous peoples, by early settlers, and by generations of families and individuals , all of whom have found wonder, awe, renewal and spiritual growth in Schmitz Park and at Alki.