When I tell people I work in South Park, I am often met with either blank stares (“Where is that?”) or sarcastic comments (“Do you work with Cartman?”). In the rarer case where my partner in conversation has heard of the scrappy little neighborhood where ECOSS’s offices are located, they usually live in Georgetown or South Park, or have the impression that aside from crime, poverty, or waste transfer stations, there’s nothing else down here.
Not true, my friends.
Among all the other strong community development and neighborhood groups, the new “Market On Wheels” South Park Farmers’ Market starts on June 20th, and last weekend kicked off yet another community mural project at the now-defunct County Line bar just over the crumbling South Park bridge… okay that may not make our little neighborhood (did I already use the word scrappy?) sound like a booming commercial center, but both the Farmer’s Market and the mural represent an ongoing commitment to revitalizing this neighborhood. Dow Constantine, who has tossed his hat into the ring for King County Executive, even signed a highly-visible pledge to support the replacement of the bridge (which carries about 20,000 vehicles every day) as part of the mural work this weekend.
So if you’ve never been south of Yesler (other than the occasional trip to Alki, that is), my suggestion is to celebrate the end of Spring by coming to South Park on June 20th for the final weekend of the mural painting and the kick-off of the Market… and yes, you should still have time to get to the Solstice Parade in Fremont to catch some cyclists in the buff.
-Audrey