STORY:
Seattle Celebrates by Lighting Bridges

Courtesy: Ross De Alessi
Lighting Design and Tidemark
Communications.)

Year 2000 celebrations include creative lighting of vital links between communities

by Clark Humphrey

The city that held a "Century 21" World’s Fair in 1962 will enter the real 21st century by lighting some "Bridges to the Future." The City of Seattle, using $500,000 in private donations, will bathe two of its most prominent bridges with colorful floodlights.

The Aurora Bridge over Lake Union and the Jose Rizal Bridge south of downtown will first be lit up in mid-November, when the World Trade Organization hosts an international conference in Seattle. The lights will stay up past New Year’s, in what the city says will "highlight the very structures that link our communities."

Six poles will be installed beneath each of the bridges with floodlights shining up at the bridge structures. Aurora will be lit with blue floodlights; Jose Rizal will be lit with white light, since the bridge itself is green. The lights will have glare shields and be aimed directly at the structures so as to avoid light spillage. The city claims the lighting systems will be extremely energy-efficient (the Jose Rizal Bridge will use roughly the same amount of energy as the average home).

It’s just one part of the Seattle Millennium Project, a citywide collection of projects and events designed to "celebrate the most beloved aspects of our city" according to city officials.

The project’s other centerpiece is the Millennium Festival, to be held Dec. 26-Jan. 1 at Seattle Center (the former World’s Fair site). Organizers hope to attract over 300,000 people to the festival, which will feature the Montreal-based Cirque Éos, nightly light shows, a Spanish-style "sculptural fire ceremony," music, dancing, an ice-skating rink, a children’s carousel, street performers, and ethnic food and art demonstrations; all culminating in a New Year’s Eve fireworks spectacular at the Space Needle.

The Millennium Project will also involve creek restoration projects in each of the four corners of the city; the planting of 20,000 trees throughout Seattle by Earth Day next April; and the recognition of community volunteers through a campaign called "Seattle Service Corps 2000."

Unfortunately, Seattle will miss out on another potential way of saying goodbye to the past with a bang on New Year’s. The Kingdome stadium, home of baseball’s Mariners and football’s Seahawks since the mid-1970s, is set to be imploded to make way for a new Seahawks home. But officials say they can’t prepare it for demolition until early January, after the Seahawks’ last game there is played and the building can be stripped of saleable equipment and fixtures.

Miss MISC.? Clark Humphrey's pop-culture report is now daily at WWW.MISCMEDIA.COM. And check out THE BIG BOOK OF MISC., now available.

DATE: 9/07/99

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