A futuristic-looking environmental education center has been proposed for one of two islands in the Anacostia River that are being converted into a nature park, D.C. Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D) said yesterday.
Creating a refuge for plants and wildlife on Kingman and Heritage islands is a longtime goal of Williams, an avid birdwatcher who paddled a canoe around the trash-strewn islands and proposed their restoration during his first mayoral campaign in 1998.
The center would be made partially from recycled wood and would use solar and geothermal technology to provide heat.
(Studios Architecture)
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The education center was added as part of the District's Anacostia Waterfront Initiative, a multibillion-dollar plan to revitalize the badly polluted river and the long-neglected land and neighborhoods on either side of it.
"We've always been moved by the very special beauty of Kingman Island," Williams said yesterday, before announcing the winner of a competition to design the environmental education center. "It beheld for us a very special opportunity. . . . We're seeing that vision become a reality now."
Studios Architecture, an international firm with offices in the District, San Francisco and elsewhere, was chosen from among 10 teams that submitted proposals for the education center.
Its $9 million building would be elevated on stilts and extend over the water. The structure would be made partially from recycled wood, with a plant nursery on the roof to filter rainwater, and would use solar and geothermal technology to provide heat.
Studios principal Todd C. DeGarmo said the center would meet the District's goal of receiving a platinum rating -- the highest possible -- from the U.S. Green Building Council. Only a handful of buildings in the country have received the rating, and none is in Washington, he said. He also said the center would include ramps leading from the ground level to the rooftop, and extending through the treetops, giving visitors, including those who need wheelchair access, new vantage points for observing bird and plant life.
Environmentalists and developers long have battled over who should control Heritage and Kingman islands, which were created by the Army Corps of Engineers in 1916 from soil dredged from the river bottom and used mostly as places to dump trash.
In 1997, the D.C. Council narrowly approved a plan to create an amusement park on the site. It was later overruled by the federally appointed financial control board.
Yesterday, Williams said he would transfer control of the islands to the Anacostia Waterfront Corp., which was created last year to implement the riverfront revitalization. The corporation will seek funding from private foundations to build the center; the city parks department might offer matching funds for donations. Once the money is raised, DeGarmo said, construction of the center should take about one year.
Environmental groups have teamed with the D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation over the past few years to remove trash and debris from the islands.
The Corps of Engineers has begun restoring damaged wetlands, and plans are underway to replace nonnative trees and plants with meadows, walking paths, canoe tie-ups, a playground and a four-acre memorial grove commemorating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center.
City officials said the $3 million restoration of the islands should be completed over the next three years.
Anacostia Waterfront Corp. Chairman Stephen Goldsmith said it is important to launch river-based projects that focus on nature, in addition to the many commercial buildings planned or underway on the riverfront.
Goldsmith announced that the corporation is seeking to fund projects that would involve D.C. residents with the river and has set aside $150,000 that could be parceled out to groups that want to launch such projects this year.
Grants would range from $2,500 to $25,000. Applicants should contact Melissa McKnight at melissa.mcknight@dc.gov or call her at the D.C. Office of Planning, 202-442-7600, which is where the waterfront corporation is based temporarily.
