Port of Everett Dedicates New Riverside Business Park Trails and Viewpoints
Date: Jul 31, 2019
Everett, Wash. – Today, Port of Everett and Riverside Business Park employees gathered to dedicate 1.4 miles of new waterfront trail and several viewpoints that are a component of the City of Everett’s non-motorized transportation network. The trails are the latest of the Port’s $1.3 million investment in trails and open space at its 85-acre industrial park located off Marine View Drive and Broadway on the Snohomish River in Everett. The event featured an Americana-themed pet parade.The occasion celebrated the Port’s completion of five new 10-foot wide paved trail segments to create a connected shoreline trail system at the business park. The trail features two viewpoints, four benches and a 50-foot wide riparian landscape buffer of sustainable, native plantings to add benefit to the river and wildlife habitat. Two additional trail segments will be built connecting to the City of Everett property to the east when those lots are developed.
“Adding another link to the city-wide bike trail network is an important Port contribution to the quality of live enjoyed by our community,” Port of Everett CEO Les Reardanz said. “The trails not only serve our community, but also enhance the daily lifestyle experience of the 700 Riverside workers and contribute to the advantages to offer in recruitment of high quality employers to the Port.”
The Port purchased the Riverside Business Park property from Weyerhaeuser in 1998 and has since worked diligently to restore the former mill site by cleaning up years of legacy contamination, bringing in thousands of cubic yards of clean fill to raise the site out of floodplain levels and constructing public infrastructure to support site development.
Today, the site supports 700 jobs with another 100 jobs anticipated and serves a variety of light-industrial users including Fortune 100 companies.
“This is a prime example of the Port’s proven track record leveraging public-private investment to bring former mill sites back into use and onto tax rolls, while also providing an appropriate balance of industry and open space development.” Reardanz said.
This scenic stretch of shoreline trail was built in nine segments timed with site development from 2014 to 2019. It is a component of the City of Everett’s Shoreline Master Plan and the City’s Everett Bicycle System Master Plan which provides a planning roadmap that promotes bicycling as a safe, convenient and viable mode of non-motorized transportation and open space uses.
The northwest end of the trail will ultimately be connected into the City’s Mill Town Trail and, through it, to the Port of Everett Marina where the Port has invested more than $26 million in new public access since 2006. The final section of trail at the southeast end of the business park will be added by future developers and eventually connect into the City’s property where a trail system to be developed will connect to the uplands via an overpass bridge to downtown.
For more information, please contact Catherine Soper, the Port’s Public Affairs Manager, at 425.388.0680 or by e-mail at catherines@portofeverett.com.