Site Report #2: Environmental History
The history of block 13 contained some changes over the past years. Although, it was not an huge change for the most part, it still changed how the alleyway looked like. In 2010, block 13 had several trees on some of the buildings then in 2013-2015, the trees were no longer there. Today, there is not any trees in the alleyway. Changes occur for the good or for the bad depending on the situation it is in. Was the changes in block 13 good thing or bad thing? Did it affect the living situation among the residents? Maybe, it did and maybe it did not. But, it surely made an huge differences in the environmental portion of block 13. Although finding some historical informations of the block 13 was challenging, but, I mangaged to dig up some informations that helped me understand the history of block 13.
It was diffcult to find a map that was very close to my block prior to the 1850. I'm assuming because my block is in an alleyway, it does not have much map of it compared to thoses who have buildings, resturants, and etc. However, I did find a map from the 1960's,2010, and 2013-15 that shows the entire University of Washington campus and also of the U District area. If you look very closely at the map from 1920s (by zooming in, would be your best luck at it) you would be able to see my block! Although, this map is very hard to actually see my block, atleast you can view what the area of the campus and the U District looked like back in 1961. But, based on what I can see on the map, you cannot tell if some of the buidlings are either businesses or apartment/housing. Also, in the map, you can see some blank areas in the map which indicates to me that nothing was built there during the 1960's compared to today, the area is most likely filled with either housing or businesses.
Seattle Office of Planning and Community Development wrote on January 2015, "The 1998 University Community Urban Center Plan designated NE 42nd St, NE 43rd St and Brooklyn Ave NE as neighborhood green streets to provide attractive and highly landscaped pedestrian routes in the U District. With Link light rail coming to the U District in 2021, an up-tick in growth is expected, creating opportunities for implementing these streetscape improvements." The environment will change around block 13 because due to this plan, it allows the block to be more attractive possibly by adding more trees and grass, which this block truly needs right now. Also, by adding more green to the block it provide an opporunity for the block's environment history to change rather not having any development to the block at all.
In 2010, the map revealed that it contained several trees and possibly grass in the alleyway. But, when compared to the map from 2013/15, it showed it did not have much trees. Why? What caused it to not have anymore? 3-5 years later, no more trees were on the road of block 13 and just concerte. Perhaps, the reason for it being gone is because concerte covered some of the grass when refixing the road due to the cracks, or having big trees in the alleyway concerned several residents who lived there since it may trapped people in, hurt their vehicles, or even hurt people (if fell down). Maybe, it was taken down to prevent any harm for people who lived there and perfer having trees in the front of their houses instead of the back. But, what about the grass? It could of been the lack of care destoryed the grass or has mentioned previously that the concerte may have destoryed it when refixing the road. Which is possible.
In 2014, two houses were sold to create an seven story tall building apartment take over its spot. One of the houses was built in 1983 which can explained why it the apperence of the house is very old, I wonder if the other apartmens and houses were built around the same time frame. The environmental effects development on this land is that none of the housings/apartments actually renovated their building and as time goes on, the older the building gets. It is more diffcult to fix and renovate older building because some of the applicances are older which causes them to break down quicker and harder to replace since it may not have the certain piece compare to a new housing/apartment where it is more common to find what you are looking for. It may explained why the owner sign an permit to allow the construction worker to use its land since the house may not have any use to it and an newer building can attract new renters and bring in business. But, as I was walking in my block, I encountered some of the construction worker catcalling me as I taking pictures in broad daylight. I felt uncomfortable, but luckily, I bought someone with me at that time. It makes me wonder, did the construction worker do this towards other women who walks in the alleyway? Do they catcall other female resident as they work? I wonder what women went through as they walked in the alleyway overtime.
The environmental present of the block is that it has a lot of pre-urban landscape and current on-going natural processes. As you can see, I provided an image of one of the cracks in the alleyway. Some of the cracks branches out to another crack and to another. One of the roads overlap with the another road which created a crack in between them making the road more deeper rather a smooth road to drive your car on. The cracks could of occured because of the weather changes throughout the year or because of how old the alleyway is and no new concrete is made in the alleyway. The reason why I believe this is because throughout the entire alleyway, there is an crack that you cannot miss it when you are walking. The roads being overlap with one another can be cause of heavy trucks that comes by in the alleyway to pick up the garbage and the recycle and the amount of cars that drives there everyday throughout the years can be the cause.
In the image, you can see some grass and some dirt of where the fences is being held right now. There could of been an area fuilled with grasses or trees, but, torn it down to cover it with concrete to have a road for people to drive on or torn it down because they needed to put electric post in for everyone in the alleyway to recieve electricity and the trees may have been in the way. These are evidences of the original "natural" state of the block because you can always built a new house on an old property, but you can never destory the history of it. You can always put new concrete over the road, but, overtime, it will crack due to the damages caused by the aging, weather, cars, and construction work. There is always going to be some grass, dirt, and even trees in areas because of nature in life. Every evidences, every some natural process in the block/alleyway signifed something special about the history itself and question of what is behind it.
Thus, although block 13 did not have any dramatic changes in its history; it did have major changes in the environment itself. The environment changes played a huge role because it showed that something happended and something did something to make it occur. Without the trees or grass in the alleyway, block 13 apperence did not looked as alive as it did with them. It made an huge difference in its apperence, if you looked at map from 2010 and from map 2013/15. Why did it made a difference? I honestly do not know. But, I do know, that the history of block 13 major cause was the environment situation. The situation that dramatically showed that if we tried to fix roads, we can end up killing grass, that placing trees should be planned and secure so if anything, nobody gets injured if it ever falls, and that having trees and grass can make a huge difference any environment or location. Plant more trees and grass. If we do not have any trees and we just continue to cut them down, we lose oxygen from them. We need oxygen to live, so they should live too.