This article appeared in the Sept, 2003 Kirkland Courier
Keeping light on the issue of park lights
Moss Bay and surrounding neighborhood residents turned out in force to learn about the proposed lighted ball fields at Seattle’s Magnuson Park. The issue was the main topic of discussion at the last Moss Bay Neighborhood meeting.
The room was filled with neighbors whose questions involved concerns from neighbors about what they may potentially be looking at across the lake in the future.
Thanks to some fancy footwork, a flyer was distributed to quite a few households in the Moss Bay, Market, Lakeview, Norkirk and Houghton neighborhoods informing people of the meeting and the proposed lighted ball fields at Magnuson Park.
A presentation was given by a group called ‘Friends of Magnuson Park’ (FOMP) that detailed the proposed Seattle Parks Department plan and what the group has been doing to oppose it.
Through contacting neighborhood groups and other organizations, they are trying to get the word out about how the Eastside will be drastically affected by 640,000 watts of light shining across the lake.
"We felt like we needed to talk to people on the other side of the lake since so many will be affected by this other than just those of us who live near the park," explained Kim Wells, the Eastside Liaison for FOMP.
The park proposal calls for 11 lighted ball fields, which would make it the largest sports complex of its kind in the Puget Sound Area. According to a professional lighting consultant from Portland that FOMP contacted, the complex would have the luminescence of twice the lights of Safeco Field.
Wells pointed out that Safeco Field has walls and a partial roof to contain the lights and that Lake Washington would only reflect the lights more, as would the low cloud coverage during the winter months.
"This is just not a good location for a sports complex like this," stated one neighbor, Don Winters, who said he has enjoyed living near downtown Kirkland and Lake Washington for over 25 years. "It would light up the whole north end of the lake," he exclaimed.
Neighbors were so concerned that the discussion went on informally in the foyer of the library as the Moss Bay Meeting continued on to the other agenda items.
"People seemed pretty upset and ready to take action," said Jeff Nouwens, the concerned neighbor who was happy to see that the flyers he passed out before the meeting got peoples attention. "So many people don’t even know about this and I think if even more people did we would have had standing room only in there!"
Names and numbers were taken as people continued to reiterate their concerns and willingness to take a next step with the issue. It was decided that a group needed to form on the Eastside to represent the concerns on this side of the lake with the proposed park plan.
Since then a few meetings were held and a group was formed called Eastside Friends of Lake Washington. Their first kick-off event involved a large number of people showing up at the last Kirkland City Council meeting and voicing their concerns to the city government.
"I think the large number of us showing up at this meeting really surprised the council. I heard a few sighs when we all raised our hands," exclaimed Mark Eliasen, a Norkirk resident and one of the speakers at the meeting. Rob Horwitz, a Market Neighborhood resident who also spoke at the council meeting explained, "We need to get the Kirkland City Council on board in helping us to protect our Eastside Community."
The City Council seemed receptive and the group is well on their way with a web site (www.eastsidefriends.org), e-mail (eastsidefriends@yahoo.com) and phone number (425-301-4892).
The Moss bay web site, www.mossbay.org also has a direct link to their site. Check it out for upcoming events, meetings and neighborhood news.
Laura Lee Pritt is the previous author of the Moss Bay neighborhood column. She can be reached at (425) 827-0790.