Better a one-off creek than no creek.
That block is pretty dismal, and I for one think it’s a great idea, fake or no!

Actually, the creek did at one time flow down what is now Center Street from time to time. Creeks shift over time — you can prove it by taking soil samples. The creek was frozen in place nearly 100 years ago when it was culverted. It now runs under some of Allston, angles back under City Hall to Center, goes back under Civic Center Park. This proposal would only take a small portion of the flow down Center Street and return it, the overflows would remain in the main culvert. The new public space would have outdoor dining ala Trumpetvine, lighting at night, music, markets, encourage families, and add to the already 8,000 pedestrians who use the street every day.

In the letters to the editor section of the current “East Bay Express” John Vipotal offers the brilliant, inexpensive, completely winning suggestion of doing a pilot program ala some of S.F.’s experiments wherein the street temporarily closed to traffic and a temporary park / pedestrian way installed. He suggests that a third party (e.g., Haas students) should analyze the measured financial impact on local businesses and that perhaps the City could compensate those businesses if the impact of the experiment is horribly negative. I can’t get over how sensible that idea is.

There are a lot of Christopher Alexander fans in Berkeley (and justifiably so) and one of his relevant concepts here is “gradual hardening” — you don’t master plan, you start with a flimsy approximation of an envisioned construction and then alter it or harden it based on experience of what you’ve built so far. That applies here. Let’s spend a scant 4 or 5 figures on a trial run and see how we feel about it in practice.

The decision to put water from the creek in a storm drain under Allston Way 100 years ago was arbitrary. Why there and not elsewhere? The engineers thought they got it right, but Center Street behaves like a river now when it rains, transporting 3-5 inches of rainwater. Walter Hood’s design will really capture people’s imagination about the historical ecology of the Strawberry Creek region, highlighting this and other little-known natural processes occurring before we, as Joni Mitchell said, “paved paradise, put up a parking lot.” I like the idea of doing trial closing days.

(Just to be clear, it’s not *my* idea. I got in from John Vipotal’s letter the editor and he in turn credits the City of San Fransisco.)