A rendering of what a re-purposed 11th Street bridge could look like.
It’s been a hot minute since we’ve heard anything about a project that could turn a portion of the old 11th Street Bridge that sits over the Anacostia River into a recreational park akin to New York City’s High Line. So what’s been going on with that, you ask? Well, big plans are currently underway to make those ideas a reality, but the planners are seeking the community’s help to decide exactly what they should do with the space.
Scott Kratz, one of the people leading the development of the 11th Street Bridge Park, updated DCist with the latest plans on the project, which developers say would connect Wards 6, 7, and 8. Right now, Kratz is asking for the public’s input for the new civic space, and on December 7, he’ll be holding two design workshops for community members to come and give their ideas as to what should be included in the park. “This needs to be a city-wide destination,” Kratz says, “and we’re encouraging all citizens to attend these meetings to give their input.”
So far, Kratz says they’ve had more than 160 meetings with community members since he first started working on this project, most of whom have suggested ideas for the space that will be rolled into a nation-wide design competition that will begin in early 2014. At the December 7 workshops, participants will help Kratz prioritize the ideas solicited from the community, which include an environmental education center, performance spaces, urban agriculture, a playground, public art that tells the history of the region, and a canoe/kayak llaunch point below on the river.
“It’s been a community-oriented project from the beginning,” says Kratz, who first became involved in the project about two years ago. Kratz says he first got involved after a conversation with Director of the Office of Planning Harriet Tregoning, with whom he’s been friends with for years. “We were out for breakfast and I asked her, ‘What’s going on with all those old bridges?” he says. She told him how she’d like to turn the old bridges into some sort of park project, and Kratz immediately got involved. Up until now, Kratz has been working on this project as a volunteer.
The 11th Street Park Project is a public-private partnership between the District Department of Transportation and The Town Hall Education Arts Recreation, or THEARC—a $27 million rec center that opened in 2005 just east of the Anacostia River in Ward 8. To fund this project, THEARC launched a pre-capital campaign in mid-July to raise $1 million to support the nation-wide design competition, economic development analysis, health impact assessment, full-time staff, and on-going programming. So far, they’ve secured $528,000 in cash and in-kind support. Kratz also says that this $1 million “will take us to the end of next year when we have a final design team and concept selected for the 11th Street Bridge Park.”
After the December 7 meetings, Kratz hopes to have a better understanding of what the community wants so he can launch the design contest. At the meetings, there will be a demonstration of computer aided design software company Autodesk’s latest program, which will deliver real-time realistic 3D visualizations of these community-inspired ideas. “If someone thinks one area needs more trees, this program will be able to instantly show what that would look like,” Kratz says.
Kratz says they hope to launch the nation-wide design competition in early 2014. The first phase of the competition, Kratz says, will involve a request for qualifications from the teams—which would include architects and other designers. After that, he says he’ll ask the teams to write an essay about their ideas for designing the park, which would incorporate all of concepts suggested by the community. He hopes to select a winner by the end of summer 2014, and begin rolling out construction of the project shortly there after. “We hope to open as soon as 2017 or 2018,” he says.
But one question—perhaps the biggest one—still lingers: Where will the funding for this project come from? Kratz says they’ve got time to figure that out, but he plans to launch a $35 million capital campaign, which includes the estimated $25 million for “constructing a new deck using existing piers and structures, and $10 million for an endowment to help partially support on-going operations and maintenance,” he says.
“We want to create a new icon for the city’s capital,” Kratz says, “something that all citizens can rally behind.”
The December 7th design workshop meetings will be held at the Matthews Memorial Baptist Church located on 2616 MLK Jr. Avenue SE. There will be a morning and afternoon session. You can find more info here.
