Big plans
Published 12:01 am Tuesday, July 5, 2011
MUKILTEO — Bigger and better trails, a picnic shelter, more parking, an off-leash dog park and maybe even a sports field are coming to Japanese Gulch.
All of this is part of the city’s vision for part of the 310-acre collection of forested wetlands cutting through Mukilteo and Everett.
The Mukilteo City Council last month approved a plan outlining a public space in the gulch. It will take years. No money has been allocated and no timeline set for most features. The goal is to preserve this environment and to give people better access to all it has to offer, Mukilteo Mayor Joe Marine said.
“Having access to it is a lot more important that just living near it,” he said. “It’s good for the soul to be able to get out and walk in a nice, green space.”
The city’s plan for the Japanese Gulch so far only encompasses two city-owned portions: 14.7 acres north of Fifth Street and 37 acres south from Fifth Street to 11th Street. Volunteers are scheduled to start working on trails this summer.
Most of the gulch runs through Everett. Mukilteo owns just less than 60 acres. Officials hope to buy the 97 acres owned by the Spokane-based Metropolitan Creditors Trust. The price tag for that land is estimated between $4 million and $8 million, Marine said. He said the price hasn’t been set, and the city is working with the landowner.
Their plan just got a boost from the $500,000 awarded by the Snohomish County Conservation Futures Fund. City staff will apply again in the following years and expect to get more grants.
“It shows other partners that we are not just trying to do it ourselves,” Marine said. “We wouldn’t be trying to do this if we didn’t think it was a realistic goal.”
Cascade Land Conservancy, a land conservation organization that helps communities acquire parks, is negotiating on behalf of the city.
City staff also plan to ask the Legislature next year to fund some Japanese Gulch projects. The city just got $200,000 from the Washington Wildlife and Recreation Program to build a half-mile of trail in the Big Gulch.
Numerous volunteers created most of the trail network in the forest, led by the nonprofit Japanese Gulch Group.
The trails crisscross the ravine through public and private land, said Heather McCartney, the city’s director of Community Development. As soon as they get the necessary permits, crews will start realigning existing trails so they don’t go through private property. These trails must move unless property owners agree to let the public use their land, McCartney said.
The Japanese Gulch Group has set aside $600 for trail signs. In addition, the city plans to work with local Boy Scout troops or other organizations to install informational kiosks, McCartney said. One of the goals is to use trails to connect neighborhoods within the city.
There will be a short trail north of Fifth Street to the Japanese Gulch Creek fish passage, said Debby McGehee of the Japanese Gulch Group. Work is on hiatus while one or two blue herons nesting in nearby trees raise their babies. South of Fifth Street, city officials plan to expand the 15-space parking lot, and build a picnic area and an off-leash area for dogs. A loop trail also is planned, with signs clearly showing public property boundaries.
Officials also have talked about putting a sports field in the gulch. The community garden on the corner of 77th Street SW and 44th Avenue W. would have to move to make room for that, Council President Richard Emery said. That’s because the garden sits on one of the only spots in the gulch flat enough for a sports field that also isn’t environmentally sensitive.
Katya Yefimova: 425-339-3452; kyefimova@heraldnet.com
