`String Of Pearls' Chokes Off View Of Lake Washington

Proponents call it the "String of Pearls," but to others it's a noose around their neck - a string of problems.

What's generating the controversy is a proposal by a neighborhood group, the Leschi Improvement Council, to give the public greater access to Lake Washington by opening up four street ends - the String of Pearls - along Lakeside Avenue South, creating small passive parks for neighbors to sit on benches and enjoy the view.

The properties, all public rights-of-way, extend to the water at the ends of South King, Dearborn, Charles and Norman streets. At present, most are blocked by hedges and fences and, to the casual observer, look like private property.

On a couple of them, next-door property owners have built garden sheds or green houses. On another, there's an old hot tub now used as a sandbox. In most cases, the structures and thick hedges have been there for decades.

There's really nothing unusual about that, though. The city Engineering Department, in charge of all street rights-of-way, permits adjacent property owners to fix up unused street ends if they want to, reducing city maintenance costs. Ultimately, however, public uses take precedence over any private interests, said Kirk Jones of the Engineering Department, meaning that any group that makes a proposal for public use will get a hearing from city officials, even if adjacent property owners object.

The Seattle Parks Department is studying 80 unused street ends on Seattle's lakes and Puget Sound shoreline, which could be opened up for public use.

In Leschi, Vic Warren, president of the Lakeside Avenue South Association, said many property owners near the four street ends and elsewhere along the Leschi waterfront want to keep them closed because residents fear opening them to the public will bring drinking parties, noise, litter, vandalism, drugs and property crimes to an already crime-ridden area.

For those reasons, real-estate values for properties next to the street ends will fall, too, according to Warren. And he also challenges the Leschi Improvement Council's claims that it will be able to keep the street ends clean through a volunteer maintenance program. The maintenance bill, he predicts, will end up being footed by the Parks or Engineering departments.

His views are disputed by Leschi Improvement Council President Karen Daubert and members Dean Kentala and John Barber.

At each of the Leschi street ends, they envision cutting down the hedges that block the water from view and installing a bench where neighborhood residents, out bicycling or jogging, could stop for a rest and contemplate the scenery.

They don't expect the street ends to attract many outsiders and say the sites are not intended for boat launching or swimming. That's how it has worked so far on Mercer Island, where eight street ends have been opened to the shoreline over the past 20 years.

"People are not going to rush to a neighborhood street end. It's not a draw," says Gary Feroglia, the island's parks and recreation director.

Nor did the street ends become magnets for misbehavior. "The (negative) impacts that were envisioned never materialized," said Feroglia, who added that security at some sites on Mercer Island improved because the areas became more open visually and upland neighbors helped keep an eye on things.

Still, Warren is skeptical. "Would you like a public park three feet from your bedroom window, or your summer deck or backyard swing set?" he asks in a flier his group is mailing around the neighborhood.

Within the next month, the Leschi Improvement Council will ask the city to settle the issue. "I think reality would be that the adjacent property owners are going to fight us," Kentala said.

"We're determined to beat them," Warren said.