The project imagines how a park that gauges floods could also gauge civic involvement, operating as a section from low to high, of Individual Contribution (Creekside Landscape), Civil Organization (Recycling Center/Walk) , Civic Action (Floodwater Ramps), and Individual Leadership (Speaker’s Platform/Flood Gauge).

Individual Leadership’s contribution is what we all contribute to urban ecosystems: increased runoff, erosion, and decreased biological complexity. The pastoral creekside landscape—planted and buttressed with gabion debris-catchers—can allow development and water enjoyment to coexist.

Civil Organization is built through a recycling effort, where the industrial aesthetic of the flood gauge structure is echoed in the recycling cages and in the tracks of the rail car that would remove the recyclables. The piped water would be enhanced by steam at gatherings and events. Channels would be integrated with benches, and flood control structures would double as intimate seating spaces.

When people are ready to advance to the next level of responsibility, Civic Action, they move uphill on the steel ramps that pivot at midpoint, allowing people experience the precariousness of civic action. They have to take action by manually turning centrally located cranks. But they would be helped in floods because the water would lift the walks for them.

When they were ready to lead, citizens would walk the new steps to the existing flood gauge and its platform which has been converted to a speakers platform. From here they exert Individual Leadership, standing alone, as leaders often do, encouraging fellow citizens to see the world anew.