Up by the riverside: the Corvallis (Ore.) Riverfront Commemorative Park is the centerpiece of a riverside revival. (Great parks: the Corvallis Commemorative Riverfront Park).

Area farmers driving trucks stacked with organically grown eggplant, tomatoes, herbs and produce of all varieties arrive at the new Corvallis (Ore.) Commemorative Riverfront Park by 6:00 a.m. each Saturday. Vendors set up booths near Jackson Plaza in the adjacent parking stalls designed with metal markers delineating booth locations. Seasoned customers, knowing that shopping early is key to getting the pick of the crop, wait impatiently for the market's official 9:00 a.m. opening time.

Just before the market opens, downtown's First Street is temporarily closed by a series of artistic, sculptural gates. A major thoroughfare all other days, First Street is filled on Saturdays with vendors and their wares, drawing visitors out of the city's historic core and down to the revitalized waterfront. Inline skaters and cyclists move past the market scene, enjoying the nearby multi-modal trail as it traces the river's edge through this award-winning park.

Jackson Plaza is a center of activity as children play in the interactive fountain, while parents lounge on the basalt seating that frames the fountain. People stroll on the path along the water's edge, sharing views of the newly restored riverbank with runners, skaters and cyclists. Basalt benches underneath a grove of trees provide quiet, contemplative places to read books, watch people and enjoy the Willamette River's scenic beauty.

To a casual visitor, the Corvallis Riverfront Commemorative Park is full of vibrant activities that respond to the context of the river and its surrounding environment. Residents of Corvallis, however, appreciate the newly completed park on a deeper level, as the project sparked nearly two decades of heated public debate that, in the end, contributed to both the park's final character and its ultimate success.

Community Context

Corvallis is nestled in the heart of Oregon's Willamette Valley, within 90 minutes of the metropolitan Portland area, world-class skiing and the spectacular Oregon coast. Corvallis has a residential population of 52,450, and is home to Oregon State University.

Efforts to improve the downtown's riverfront have been underway since the 1970s, when public outcry squelched plans for a riverfront vehicular bypass. Corvallis Parks & Recreation was given permission to develop a master plan for a park in its place. The site, however, stretches 4,300 linear feet between the downtown business district and the river's edge, and remained relatively unimproved until the 1990s.

After years of review and public process, the Corvallis City Council adopted a park master plan in December 1996. The plan outlined the vision for the park as a downtown showcase, featuring commercial and park use while highlighting the Willamette River's natural features. In 1998, voters approved a $9.5 million bond measure to fund the riverfront park and riverbank restoration project.

The design team of Corvallis-based CH2M HILL civil engineers and the Portland-based firm of Walker Macy landscape architects and planners was chosen in 1997 by the city to develop detailed design and construction documents for the new Corvallis Riverfront Commemorative Park. CH2M HILL and Walker Macy were charged by the city and the community to design and implement the new park as an urban gathering place to enhance the community's enjoyment of the riverfront.

After languishing in planning stages for decades, the $14.5-million, 10-block riverfront redevelopment project was finally going to realize the community's desire for new park amenities, First Street improvements, and stabilization and restoration of the riverbank as a tribute to local personality, art and materials.

Public Process

Walker Macy and CH2M HILL worked throughout the design process to achieve community consensus on this high-profile project. The design team worked hand in hand with a community-based design review committee to ensure direct community feedback as the plan evolved. The public process included regional, state and local agencies, community stakeholders, Oregon State professors, the Corvallis Arts Council and local downtown business leaders. The firms helped the city with a variety of public outreach activities, including design workshops, open houses, public meetings and a project newsletter.

Corvallis Mayor Helen Berg says that the sometimes strident debate over the project's direction may have resulted in a better park. "It was very thoughtfully done," she says of the public process. "I'm fond of saying that every square inch of the riverfront was deliberated upon and voted upon. You can view that as very considerable citizen participation. Maybe that is how come it turned out so well!"

The greatest challenge of the project was designing in the narrow area available a linear park that could balance the various visions of the community members. The design needed to provide park and pedestrian amenities, protect the natural features of the river and support the newly developing retail businesses on First Street.

After so many years of dealing with the riverfront project, Mayor Berg has concluded that the reason it sparked such passionate debate is that the park must accommodate many competing values into a relatively small space. "I hope we have included everyone's values--perhaps not in the proportions they would have wanted, but they're all there," she says.

Project Scope

Stretching 4,300 linear feet along the Willamette Riverfront, the Corvallis Commemorative Park and Riverbank Restoration improved more than 25 acres of public property. This public open space between the downtown business district and the river's edge focuses on providing opportunities for celebration, interpretation and contemplation. The design, which incorporates basalt, water and art, reflects regional materials and values. It pays tribute to the Willamette River and the people who interact with it, and reclaims an incredible natural resource for the community and for regional wildlife.

The entire riverfront development was accomplished through five separate construction projects from January 1999 through October 2002. The design team prepared construction documents and provided construction oversight services for these contracts, which included multiple sources of funding, Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) contracting requirements, and coordination and permitting with ODOT, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Design Elements

The Corvallis Riverfront Commemorative Park has been designed to promote public access to the Willamette River. While the riverbank is too steep for direct river access in the downtown area, the new park provides many viewing points along the river. In addition, interpretive opportunities and artwork throughout the body of the park serve to awaken and strengthen the community's connection to the river.

According to Michael Zilis, Walker Macy's lead person on the project, "One of the basic concepts of the park design was to provide a wide variety of places to gather and to meet. At each point where the city street grid comes to the waterfront, we have celebrated it with a variety of seating areas of different sizes, types and views."

New plazas and river overlooks provide locations for interpretive signs, which discuss topics such as the natural history of the river, river ecology and the history of the Corvallis riverfront. One of the overlooks, constructed at the site of a large-scale bank slide that occurred during flooding in 1996, includes interpretive material about the slide and the importance of riverbank stability.

Artwork that celebrates the Willamette River was selected for locations throughout the park. In addition to the sculptures located near the park's plazas, bronze "waterdance" monuments are placed at Second Street intersections to mark the area as the Riverfront District. Gateway monuments, reminiscent of steamboat days, enliven the intersections with First Street and are used to close First Street for special events.

Three major plazas, each with a unique character, anchor the new park:

* Jackson Plaza is the park's main gathering place, and is designed to reflect the diverse personalities of the community from vibrant celebration to quiet reflection at the river's edge. It's composed of a series of spaces suited for various activities. A small seating grove occupies the south edge of the plaza, incorporating basalt stones, benches and art. An interpretive variable spray fountain in the center of the plaza depicts the historic Willamette River Channel and is a play feature for children. The north edge of the plaza is designed to accommodate a performance stage for events utilizing the lawn to the north.

* Monroe Plaza is developed as a contemplative public garden. The plaza features a sheltering grove with seating and game tables tucked into ornamental garden beds. A playful bronze sculpture of otters by artist Peter Helzer peers out from the lush plantings.

* Madison Plaza represents the civic core of the waterfront. Aligned with the City Courthouse on Madison Avenue, the plaza provides long seatwalls, art and a paving pattern that echoes the patterns of historic logjams on the river. Generous open space is retained to allow for community events such as the holiday tree lighting and civic presentations.

The park's design encourages a variety of non-auto uses. For safety, the design includes raised intersections and mid-block crossings, a narrowed street, and special paving to slow vehicles and alert drivers of a "pedestrian first" environment. With the inclusion of these traffic-calming measures and three-way stop signs at every intersection, vehicle speeds are reduced to minimize the potential of vehicle-pedestrian conflicts.

Park features include two restroom facilities, two bike shelters and multiple bike racks. A 12-foot-wide multimodal trail accommodates a mix of walkers, runners, strollers, skaters, wheelchairs and bicyclists. All parking, sidewalks, street crossings, the multiuse path, plazas and seating areas are totally accessible to wheelchairs.

"The path is already a major link for bicycle and pedestrian routes through town," says Zilis. "Because people use it not only for recreation, but for circulation through the city, it is a key element of connecting people to the riverfront."

In addition to connecting the public to the downtown riverfront, the new path connects at the south end of the park to a route leading to Willamette Park, a city park south of town that also includes river frontage. Projects envisioned to connect the path further to the south are underway.

Natural Resources

The ecological restoration and stabilization of the riverbank, which coincided with park development, is the largest riparian habitat enhancement on the Willamette River that has ever been undertaken. It included removing more than 100 tons of debris, unnecessary rip-rap and all invasive non-native species, and re-establishing native riparian vegetation.

The park's extensive landscape emphasizes native plants and local materials. Native plantings were designed to fit within the existing riparian plant community. Plants were located to meet their ecological requirements, natural slope positions, the need for bank stabilization and aesthetic enhancement of the riverfront. Owing to concern about bank stability after a large-scale riverbank slide in 1996, stabilization measures such as shear pile walls and drilled piers were implemented in at-risk areas.

Bruce Moser, Corvallis' project manager for design and construction, sums up the importance of the riverbank work: "Developing a compromise between stabilization of the bank and restoration of the riparian habitat was one of the most challenging design issues for the project. As a result of extensive collaboration between natural resource and engineering disciplines, the project met both design criteria of improving habitat as well as insuring the safety of the park users."

Preservation of existing trees was a key goal of the riverbank work. Care was taken to protect existing trees before and during construction, such as selecting locations of the underground concrete pile walls to minimize impact to trees. The Corvallis Riverfront Commemorative Park and riverbank improvements resulted in no loss of existing trees and a net increase of 254 trees.

The development of the Commemorative Riverfront Park supports the evolving community of Corvallis, creating a vibrant downtown gathering place that succeeds in meeting the needs of its diverse citizens as well as those of the environment. The following words from the Corvallis 2020 Vision Statement accurately describe what redevelopment of the downtown riverfront has added to the central city:

"Corvallis in 2020 boasts a central city that is the vibrant commercial, civic, cultural and historic heart of the county. Corvallis' vibrant riverfront is the city's downtown showcase that respects and celebrates the river. The riverfront features a variety of restaurants and shops, a public square, and ample greenspace with jogging and cycling paths. The public square is a frequent site for lunchtime concerts and summer entertainment. The upper stories of many picturesque riverfront buildings provide some of the downtown's most desirable residences and office space."

Making the Economic Connection

Redeveloping the riverfront is also an economic revitalization effort. In addition to creating an attractive park that draws community members, tourists and events to the riverfront area, special zoning requirements have been developed for the riverfront area. A Riverfront Zone has been included in the Corvallis Land Development Code Update, currently under review by Oregon's Department of Land Conservation and Development. The Riverfront Zone requires a three-story maximum for new development, and encourages upper-floor residences mixed with first-story commercial use. The new zoning requirements are intended to encourage public access and activity along the riverfront, creating an area that's both safe and vibrant as redevelopment occurs.

Park designer Michael Zilis asserts that the biggest long-term benefit of this effort is the revitalization of First Street. "This was a forgotten edge, as the city had developed in other directions and turned its back on the river," he says. "With this new park, people are realizing the value of the riverfront and adjacent businesses are blossoming. We now have cafes, bakeries and restaurants facing the waterfront and building vital connections between the downtown area and the riverfront."

Mauricio Villarreal is an associate with the Portland, Oregon-based firm of Walker Macy Landscape Architects and Planners. As project landscape architect for the Corvallis Riverfront Commemorative Park, Villarreal worked closely with city of Corvallis staff, citizens and members of the multidisciplinary design and construction team. For more information about the Corvallis Commemorative Riverfront Park, go to www.ci.corvallis.or.us/ RiverFrontPark/.