Thinking about the garden #3

The park was going to close as the result of construction for the Springwater Trail “Spur” however the date seemed to become a moving target and many times it became hurry up and wait. We knew that once the park did close that it would not re-open for several months. With that our volunteers would not have access to the garden to bring equipment and material. Whatever we wanted to work with needed to be put on the island before the park closed and the longer that it took the project to start the more materials that we were going to need to last us. Until the re-opening.

The first effort we made was to select boulders that would eventually become the foundation for the garden and the stream bed and that turned out to be between 25 and 30 boulders that weighed 500 to 2000 pounds. All of these boulders had been in the park and along the Springwater Trail and needed to be moved to make way for the construction. The best thing about them was the type of boulders that they were, old, rounded and smooth, matching the existing boulders that where in the park and those used when the garden was first built. Campbell Crane was asked to provide a cost to move them onto the island, which would entail their using a massive crane to pick up the boulder and move them 80 feet in the air and place them onto the island. Campbell gave Todd Jones and myself the cost and when asked if they could provide a discount because of our non-profit status, they decided to do it pro bono.

The day that was chosen to do the project it had snowed overnight, about an inch or a bit more and I was the first to arrive on site, it was beautiful, especially the bridge and the garden view from the parking lot. Several people showed up to view the project and Gene and Sue were there along with Todd to move and stage the boulders to be ready for the crane. Also there for the project was Denny Chappell to take pictures and video and KATU News was on site. The project took 2-3 hours of move time which included the movement of a Japanese lace leaf maple that our volunteers had dug from the yard of a person that donated it. The root ball was huge and must have weighed 1000 pounds or more and it was everything the tractor could do to drag it to the staging area. To see this tree move through the air attach to the crane cable and be placed at our feet.