OLYMPIC SCULPTURE PARK BEACH DESIGN ANALYSIS
Seattle, Washington

2008 GOLD AWARD - ENVIRONMENTAL

2008 TOP RESTORED BEACH AWARD

The goal of Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park project was to create an urban oasis of aesthetic and natural beauty and environmental function at a former industrial site north of Pier 70 at the Seattle waterfront. Coast & Harbor Engineering was part of the design team that designed the waterfront features, which buttressed the existing, aged Alaskan Way Seawall, created subtidal and intertidal habitat beneficial to salmon, and designed a beach section to have the appearance and function of a typical Central Puget Sound beach, yet minimize maintenance cost.

CHE performed the following project tasks:

	2-D wave transformation modeling, modeled hydrodynamics of wave impact on a gravelly beach, and determined material stability in support of beach design.
	Specified design wave and water level parameters, modeled wave runup and overtopping, and calculated stable rock size for various locations across the profile and along the project shoreline.
	Determined wave impact forces against the vertical face of the exposed seawall and wave uplift forces on the cantilevered section of sidewalk attached to the seawall.
	Determined the habitat beach material types, optimized for desired beach slope and post-project wave exposure.