PARK
Concept
Water creates every cycle on earth.
Water is the element that creates life. Its cycle is the most important on earth; it is the one that rules every other cycle.
Time passes, plants grow, the main structure remains the longest: in humans, the bones, in plants, their stems.
The rains make the frogs call, the birds chirp, the coyotes to howl and all the animals to start living and creating their cycle.
Park Narrative
The park intersects Pantano Wash at The Loop ciclovia. The city is proposing adding more ciclovias along Tanque Verde Creek and Sabino Canyon is other great point for bike rides.
These three points have one thing in common: ephemeral but important paths of wather. This water lines are being used for linear parks, wich will have ciclovias along them and will comunicate with one to the other.
Udall Park will be a perfect location to close a new section of the ciclovia because of its geographical location uniting these paths. In addition, I propose using an area of the extension of the park’s master plan for a bike trail that can also serve for water collection along the way.
Designing the bike trail this way will help not only develop recreational uses but also to capture water, helping the park to create more habitats and wetlands.
Two areas can collect water into diferent points of the park before following their journey the the rivers. One, located in the southeast part of the park, drains to Pantano Wash; the other will collect water from the northeast side, and will drain to Pantano Wash.
In the southern section of the park, in addition to the bike trail described in the “City Scale” section, I propose the following new areas: additional parking lots and bathrooms, a skate park, a bike park, and trails using the already existing roads of the area. This will also serve as a way to create a perimeter arround the lower part of the park and use it as a natural recreational area.
In the existing north area of Udall Park, some changes are posposed: the creation of basins to collect water for the benefit of the existing plants (as well as proposed additional drought-tolerant local plants), and the addition of a children’s playground, bigger dog park, small amphiteather, and tennis and volleyball courts.
Supplemental Works 01
Water triggers every cycle.
The the gentle, soaking winter rains in the Sonoran Desert are called "Equipatas," a loanword from Yaqui. It can also literally mean "the sound of horses' hoofs."
They come from North Pacific storms moving south from Alaska and they are gentle, widespread, soaking rain from frontal storms. They come from November to March and are known as the “female rains.”
These are the counterpart to the heavy, stormy "las aguas" (the waters) of the summer monsoon season.
The word "monsoon" is derived from the Arabic word mausim, referring to the large-scale seasonal shift in prevailing winds that bring moisture. They can also be called "Chubascos," the name for a violent thunder and lightning storm during the rainy season in Mexico and Central America.
These storms come from tropical air surges from the Gulf of California and Gulf of Mexico and are intense, localized thunderstorms and deluges. Ideally--their calendar has been changing with climate change--these storms are in July to mid-September and are known as the “male rains.”
The the gentle, soaking winter rains in the Sonoran Desert are called "Equipatas," a loanword from Yaqui. It can also literally mean "the sound of horses' hoofs."
They come from North Pacific storms moving south from Alaska and they are gentle, widespread, soaking rain from frontal storms. They come from November to March and are known as the “female rains.”
These are the counterpart to the heavy, stormy "las aguas" (the waters) of the summer monsoon season.
The word "monsoon" is derived from the Arabic word mausim, referring to the large-scale seasonal shift in prevailing winds that bring moisture. They can also be called "Chubascos," the name for a violent thunder and lightning storm during the rainy season in Mexico and Central America.
These storms come from tropical air surges from the Gulf of California and Gulf of Mexico and are intense, localized thunderstorms and deluges. Ideally--their calendar has been changing with climate change--these storms are in July to mid-September and are known as the “male rains.”
Supplemental Works 02
I will focus on selected section above, which shows the biggest proposed basin for the park. It will collect water not only to feed plants on the soil surface, but also to help the absorption of the rains into the aquifer and let the park to thrive a little more. Topographically, it also signals the intersection between the bike paths and the water infrstructure, as well as a section of the skateboard park.