Houston Bets on the Bayou

FOREGROUND / PLANNING SPRING CREEK CYPRESS CREEK WEST FORK OF SAN JACINTO RIVER LAKE HOUSTON GREENS BAYOU HALLS BAYOU WHITE OAK BAYOU HUNTING BAYOU BUFFALO BAYOU BRAYS BAYOU BAYOU GREENWAYS 2020 HOUSTON GREENWAY CORRIDOR PARKS HOUSTON CITY LIMIT BETS ON SIMS BAYOU CLEAR CREEK THE BAYOU N PARKS AND BIKE PATHS EMBROIDER THE CITY IN THE BAYOU GREENWAY INITIATIVE PLAN. BY BRIAN BARTH inder Baumgardner, ASLA, the to the White House, the State De- ings suggesting that a bike path be Kpresident of SWA Group and the partment, the Department of Energy, built within the pipeline corridor managing principal of its Houston the Department of Commerce, and a from its starting point in Hardisty, oice, is not the type of landscape slew of other federal agencies with a Alberta, down to the terminus in architect to shy away from contro- stake in the project. In it were a set of Port Arthur, Texas, near Houston. versial ideas. In 2013, at the zenith overlay maps of the proposed route of the vitriolic debate around the that illustrated various ecological and “It was roundly hated,” says Baum- proposed Keystone XL pipeline, he cultural dimensions of the pipeline gardner of the idea, insisting it was sent an unsolicited design proposal landscape, as well as a set of render- not an endorsement of the pipeline BOARD PARKS HOUSTON 48 / LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE MAR 2016 FOREGROUND / PLANNING remains a useful thought experi- ment for the coupling of utility infrastructure with landscape-related programming. In Houston, the con- cept already has a tangible applica- tion in the Bayou Greenways Initia- tive, a 10- to 15-year plan to establish a continuous 300-mile network of hiking and bicycle trails along nine of the major bayous that drain the Houston area. The irst phase of the plan—called Bayou Greenways 2020—is under way, and includes 80 miles of new trails to expand on but an attempt to puncture the status were saying, ‘You shouldn’t be doing Houston’s existing 70-mile bayou quo notion of “infrastructure as a this; it’s going to make it diicult to trail system. Following the success one-dimensional thing.” Reactions operate and they’ll end up closing of SWA Group’s linear parks along were neatly divided along ideologi- it down.’” Bufalo Bayou and Brays Bayou, the cal lines. “Some people saw it as: irm was hired to develop a master ‘You’re trying to make this bad thing The Obama administration recently plan for the full-blown bayou green- better, and that might mean it would gave what appears to be the inal ax way network and has had a hand get built.’ On the other side, people to the Keystone XL pipeline project, in some of the site-speciic design who were much more conservative but SWA Group’s proposal for it work completed so far. Houston’s bayous were once braided blackwater channels, where slow- moving water leached tannins from the forested wetlands of the coastal plain as they meandered toward Galveston Bay. Today, the bayous serve as Houston’s lood control in- TOP frastructure under the jurisdiction Bufalo Bayou Park of the Harris County Flood Control is a 160-acre oasis in District; many are lined in concrete, downtown Houston. clogged with trash, and polluted from urban runof, ofering little in the way RIGHT of aesthetic, recreational, or ecological SWA Group hoped to garner bipartisan value. Yet, in a city known more for support for its vision its highways and shopping centers of Keystone XL as a than parkland, the bayous are a last multiuse corridor. untapped vestige of green space. BOTTOM GROUP, SWA TOP; SINGLETON, JONNU 50 / LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE MAR 2016 FOREGROUND / PLANNING A $100 MILLION BOND MEASURE FOR THE GREENWAYS PROJECT PASSED WITH 68 PERCENT SUPPORT BY VOTERS. Currently, 55 percent of Houston’s of approval for any referendum in ton oice and an outspoken advocate parkland is concentrated in three the city’s history. Some $95 million for bayou preservation, noticed that, large parks on the periphery of the of the $120 million in private capi- taken together, the bayous and other city. However, the dendritic pattern tal has already been raised, mostly local utility corridors form an of- of the bayous means the new lin- through large-sum donations from road grid that is roughly parallel to ear parks will be distributed equally Houston’s well-endowed oil and real the city’s street grid. The bayous run throughout the city—52 percent of estate philanthropies. west to east, while a majority of other residents live within one and a half utility corridors have a north–south miles of a bayou. The trail system “We are converting a very under- alignment. Shanley traces the pat- will connect 77 existing parks and utilized asset into something that tern back to Houston’s founders, the add an additional 50 parcels of green everybody can enjoy,” says Charles Allen brothers. “Houston’s down- space, ranging in size from under Place, the managing director of capi- town grid is rotated to the Jeferso- tal programs for the Houston Parks nian grid because the Allen brothers Board, the local nonproit spearhead- platted it [in alignment] with Bufalo ing the Bayou Greenways Initiative. Bayou,” he says of the real estate “As the lood control director says, he barons who bought the land around really only needs the bayous maybe Houston’s port on Bufalo Bayou in two days a year. The rest of the time the early 19th century. they should be available for other people to enjoy.” Utility corridors may seem like a logi- cal place to route greenways, but it’s With a $215 million capital project in not as simple as slapping a 10-foot the early stages of implementation, asphalt path along every sewer line or you would think the Houston Parks power easement that crisscrosses a Board had its hands full. But behind city. Baumgardner says the engineer- the scenes it was working on an even ing challenges for building green- more ambitious plan for Houston’s ways in loodplains are signiicant. greenways: linking the bayous with “You have to satisfy a lot of hydraulic other utility corridors—power line requirements, [even though] once it’s cuts, secondary drainage easements built it just looks like any old trail,” that feed into the main bayous, rail- he says. Flood control infrastruc- road alignments, and perhaps even ture is typically the territory of civil ABOVE two acres to more than 350 acres, oil and gas line corridors—to form a engineers, but Baumgardner says Community members which are slated for a mix of storm- comprehensive of-street recreation that initial resistance to a landscape participate in a 5K run water detention, habitat conserva- and transportation network through- architecture irm leading the design along Brays Bayou tion, and traditional park amenities. out the region. “The working title is work on Houston’s bayou greenway on the Houston Parks Board’s annual Bayou Initial funding was secured through the Green Grid,” Place says. projects has faded over time. Greenway Day. a $166 million bond measure that designated $100 million for Bayou Years ago, when looking at aerial Place says the U.S. Army Corps of Greenways; the measure passed with maps of Houston, Kevin Shanley, Engineers has “revised their thought a 68 percent vote—the highest rate FASLA, a principal in SWA’s Hous- process” around waterways in recent BOARD PARKS HOUSTON OF COURTESY SMITH, CARTER F. 52 / LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE MAR 2016 FOREGROUND / PLANNING Pilot projects to link bayou trails via power line trails are now under way, including a trail from Sims Bayou (one of the city’s major bayous) to Cambridge Village Park (a small neighborhood park) via an easement along a secondary drainage canal in a suburban neighborhood in southwest Houston, Place says. “It’s through a $1.5 million grant that CenterPoint handed to the city to kick of this whole program. We’ve done a couple trails with [Center- Point] now and are starting to get years and that the Houston Parks cent projects. “Along Brays Bayou, into a routine with them. It’s starting Board has been working “hand in [the HCFCD] is sculpting their new to work out.” glove” with the Harris County Flood channel and leaving shelves for us Control District (HCFCD) on re- to install trails and landscaping,” he In 1912, the landscape architect Ar- says. “It used to be that they would thur Comey, author of Houston’s just line [the bayous] with concrete irst comprehensive city plan, wrote to try to get the water out as fast as that “Houston is far behind other possible, but they’ve realized that progressive cities in certain respects, often causes as many problems as notably in its park system, and it solves. Now they are increasingly should act at once to remedy these working toward a more nuanced, conditions.” He went on to state that environmentally sensitive approach.” “the backbone of a park system for Houston will naturally be its bayou A bill adopted in 2013 by the Texas or creek valleys, which…furnish op- legislature smooths out another road- portunity for parks of unusual value block commonly encountered on within a comparatively short distance TOP greenway projects: liability concerns. of most of the residential areas.” De- Proposal for a multiuse The bill, originated by Representa- spite the best intentions, good ideas trail piggybacking on tive Jim Murphy (R-Houston), a local in urban planning sometimes take a an existing power line cycling enthusiast and businessman, century or more to bear fruit.

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