CLARK’S CREEK GREENWAY

The team of Jackie Brookner and Susan Steinman was awarded the 2002 Art and Community Landscapes commission to be Artists-in-Residence with the National Park Service Rivers and Trails Program in the Northwest region. Art and Community Landscapes was a partnership of the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Park Service and the New England Foundation for the Arts that supported site-based public art as a catalyst for action at the community level.

In 2002-3 they worked in Caldwell, ID, Tillamook, OR and Puyallup, WA, providing consultation and preliminary planning, and building community support for each town’s waterway project. With extensive outreach across stakeholder and community groups, they built many new partnerships, created local public art initiatives, started now annual river and trail festivals, and helped design conceptual plans for river daylighting, stream restoration and trails.

In Puyallup, we worked to support plans for the Clark’s Creek a greenway corridor. Clark’s Creek emerges from artesian springs and flows two miles to its confluence with the Puyallup River. The greenway addresses water quality and flood control issues, provide public access to the watershed, and create opportunities for public-private interests in watershed stewardship.

We worked with local primary school art and science programs to produce the “I am Clark’s Creek “ booklet.  Told from the creek’s point of view, it encourages healthy watershed practices for homeowners along the Creek.