Check out what a new bridge and restored estuary could look like in downtown Olympia
What it will be like to drive from one side of Olympia to the other once Capitol Lake is restored to an estuary? Now you can visualize it with renderings of the new Fifth Avenue Bridge and the conceptual design of the Deschutes Estuary.
The state Department of Enterprise Services (DES) has released the renderings and is continuing to look for community input. DES plans to have the project 30% designed by the end of the year.
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The department plans to host formal opportunities for public comment as the design progresses. The best way for people to stay involved is to subscribe to the Deschutes Estuary newsletter, and to send questions and comments to info@DeschuteEstuaryProject.org.
During the City of Olympia’s Sea Level Rise Response meeting Sept. 6, Ann Larson with DES gave an update on what was found when Capitol Lake was drained this summer, and how that information will help the design process.
Larson said the lake was at its lowest level on July 24, and it gave DES an opportunity to evaluate the hydraulic model, as well as estimate lake water surface elevation.
She said DES also will look at Heritage Park and how it could be redesigned to benefit estuary restoration and keep rising water levels at bay. Larson said they’ve designed some “green shore” on Heritage Park, which will help with sea level rise. Green shore has natural shoreline features such as riparian vegetation, large woody debris, and sand, cobble, and gravels.
“Some of the things that we’re looking at are a living shoreline and floodable landscape,” Larson said. “But as far as the plan was concerned, we had talked about an elevated path at Heritage Park to help with the flooding that happens there.”
She said Heritage Park floods frequently, and the idea is to elevate areas and construct a horizontal levee, a gently sloping, vegetated buffer to keep water from spilling out of the future estuary.
Response collaborative chair Carolyn Cox jokingly asked whether anything crazy like a dead body had been found when the lake was drained. Larson said the most exciting thing they found was a bicycle.
2025-2026 sea level rise response plan
Olympia’s Climate Program director Pamela Braff gave the response collaborative an update on the two-year sea level rise response plan, which will cost $360,000.
Costs are split between the City of Olympia, which is responsible for 50%, and the Port of Olympia and LOTT Clean Water Alliance, which are each responsible for 25%. The two-year plan calls for $90,000 annually from Olympia, $45,000 from LOTT and $45,000 from the port.
Braff said the work plan contains mostly short-term efforts that are largely informational or planning in nature, and analysis. She said it doesn’t include any major implementation activities that are associated with longer-term work.
The six projects on the two-year plan include refining the sea level rise and flood monitoring strategy, developing guidelines to incorporate sea level rise into capital planning, continuing to investigate long-term public financing mechanisms, evaluating vertical land motion, updating the sea level rise response collaborative’s website, and pursuing state and federal funding.
Braff said refining the flood monitoring strategy will ensure the city understands when it needs to implement a mid-term or long-term adaptation strategy.
“This has to do with refining how we’re currently monitoring sea level rise,” Braff said. “That could be things like taking measurements after storm events, monitoring high tide flooding, looking at national and global projections.”
She said this will involve developing a long-term monitoring and reporting system. It will cost $75,000 to hire a technical consultant to help with this work.
Braff said the city will continue investigating long-term public financing mechanisms, but it’s unclear right now how much money is needed to finance long-term projects.
She said the city will hire a consultant to assess the revenue levels that would be needed to finance long-term adaptation strategies, and then convene a financial work group to evaluate those options and develop funding recommendations. It may come as a modification to stormwater utility rates, she said.
Evaluating vertical land motion will give the city a better understanding of “subsidence,” or sinking, in the downtown area and port peninsula. Braff said data is likely to become available in the next year or so, and it will give staff a historical perspective.
Braff said the collaborative’s website hasn’t been updated since it was first established a couple years ago.
“We want to make sure to update that website so that it’s showing the most up-to-date information, and perhaps develop some new resources or information and information to answer some of those commonly asked questions that we get about sea level rise in Olympia and how we’re responding to it,” Braff said.
The two-year plan also includes the collaborative funding a liaison position to support the collaborative and the implementation of short-term projects. The responsibilities of the liaison include facilitating executive committee meetings and staff-level technical work group meetings, doing community outreach and engagement, working with regional partners, refining planning documents, developing grant proposals, and more.
Braff said the city is continuing to pursue state and federal funding to implement larger actions.
“So now that we’ve nearly completed the near term, and those actions are meant to be completed between 2019 and 2024, we’re starting to look towards those midterm actions that are supposed to be completed by mid century,” she said. “So where we are right now is thinking about doing the design and planning and engineering for those midterm adaptation actions.”
This story was originally published September 16, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
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