Creating ‘Central Park’

Sunday, June 11, 2000 | 9:44 a.m.

Archaeologist Greg Seymour surveys a heap of weathered, gray boards splayed on the ground before him.

The broken peak of a collapsed barn roof sits atop the pile, tangled with thick limbs downed from a giant cottonwood. Thick, damp air rises sticky and close around Seymour as he gazes over his domain.

This hidden niche, with its towering trees and ragged shrubs, is destined to become a showplace for nature in the nation's most neon town.

When the Las Vegas Springs Preserve opens in 2005, creators say it will be the first -- and only -- park of its kind in Southern Nevada. They're calling it the "Central Park" of Las Vegas.

They envision an oasis of trees and wildlife and a showcase for pre-glitz Las Vegas smack-dab in the middle of the urban sprawl to which the area's springs gave birth.

The Las Vegas Valley Water District owns the land that spans 180 acres and will cost an estimated $171 million to develop as a preserve -- daunting statistics in a city where parks are typically small and few and far between.

There will be no jogging tracks, soccer fields or wide lawns for Frisbee-tossing.

"It's not a park in the traditional sense at all. You're not going to have swing sets and barbecues," J.C. Davis, water district spokesman, said.

"And it's not going to be just for history buffs or environmental buffs," Davis said. "It's an opportunity for the water district to teach people about what it means to live in the desert and what we have to do to preserve it."

Historical site

Las Vegas Springs is arguably the most significant historic site in the valley. If it hadn't been for the water supplied by its springs, American Indians, explorers and others would have had no reason to linger here.

The area wouldn't have been called "Las Vegas" -- a Spanish name meaning "the meadows" that was inspired by the springs.

The water district has pretty much kept the place to itself the past 50 years, trying to protect the fragile springs.

But now officials say it's time to open the gates. People will be able to wander along trails and boardwalks. They will meander through cottonwood stands, look for wildlife, observe a wetlands working in the desert, learn how ancient humans lived in this harsh environment and see how it still affects human life today.

These lessons will cost plenty -- almost $1 million an acre. And the tab is divided three ways.

The water district will pay for $110.8 million of the work. The Clark County Regional Flood Control District is expected to cover a $5.9 million wetlands project. And the private, nonprofit Las Vegas Springs Preserve Foundation will raise the remaining $54.5 million for the visitors' center and interpretive projects.

The water district's share includes a $47.3 million in infrastructure work that the agency planned to do anyway, Davis said.

Las Vegas Springs still supplies water to the city's urban core in the summer and the agency needs to add at least 1,000 feet of new pipeline and replace an aging 40-million-gallon reservoir, along with some other upgrades. The district also will pay for adding water, sewer and electrical service for the visitors' center and exhibits.

The replacement reservoir will be located on top of the old one, on the preserve's west entrance on Meadows Avenue. Its protective cover will double as a parking lot.

The water district will spend another $51.2 million on plants and structures for the planned 10-acre conservation garden on the park's southern end.

That area will be dotted with desert-friendly flora and will include an amphitheater and the bulk of the preserve's conservation education exhibits.

The district also will pay $1 million for archaeological and biological research of the historic spring mound site, which has been used by humans for as long as 5,000 years.

Restoration of the old springs caretaker's ranch on the park's north side is expected to cost the district about $7 million, and the agency also will pay $2.3 million for restoration of a wetlands site -- called a cienega -- in the center of the preserve.

The flood control district's estimated $5.9 million contribution will pay for the bulk of the cienega project, which calls for making its basin deeper and planting vegetation around it, Davis said.

While public money will pay for the structures that will help preserve the springs, money raised by the private Las Vegas Springs Foundation will cover costs of the things most people will see.

The nonprofit group's contributions will pay for most of the visitors' center and museum and interpretive signs and displays throughout the preserve, Davis said. The privately raised money will not cover infrastructure costs or water district projects.

No one doubts that $54.5 million is a big chunk of change. But foundation members also have no doubts about raising it, Janie Greenspun Gale, foundation president, said.

"It is going to come from the community -- from those of us who have been in this town and made money in this town," she said.

The foundation will pitch in $42.9 million for the visitors' center and museum. The water district will come up with another $2 million for that project.

Foundation members also have committed to kicking in $3.6 million for the conservation garden, $500,000 for the spring mound site, $5 million for the cienega and $2.5 million for the northern preserve and ranch site.

And although the final plans aren't even in blueprints yet, people already are writing the checks. Amy Ayoub, the foundation's fund development director, is reluctant to say how much money has been collected, but says she has received single donations ranging from $10,000 to $1 million.

"We have a foundation full of people who are connected to (other) foundations and corporations," Ayoub said. "Our first step is to speak individually with members and seeing what kind of commitments they can make individually or from their foundations or corporations."

The foundation also has a grant-writer who has identified at least 100 possible local or national sources of money, Ayoub added. Some are environmental grants, while others have to do with education.

Linda Littell, project assistant manager, says they also are looking for ongoing sources of money to cover operation costs once the preserve is open.

Endowments are one way to do it, Littell said. A gift shop is another. Studies of similar facilities have shown 75 percent to 80 percent of operation costs can be covered by gate admissions and concession sales, she said.

Fund-raisers also are trying to cut a deal with the Nevada State Museum to move from its current spot at Lorenzi Park to the new preserve site. That would help because the museum would provide its own staff and other services, Littell said.

At this point, the women said, all options are being explored. No stone is being left unturned.

Turning stones

Seymour is turning plenty of stones on his own.

With the help of one other full-time archaeologist and a couple of part-time assistants, Seymour has logged the preserve's historical sites according to what they have found on the surface.

The spring mound is one of two areas showing significant signs of human habitation dating back 3,000 to 5,000 years, Seymour said. He now is looking for clues beneath the surface of the site.

He'll search for bone shards from animals that early inhabitants may have cooked and chunks of carbon to figure out where the fires were built. He'll look for the pollen that can tell what plants were brought in for cultivation or cooking. Depending on the types of pollen he finds, he can even figure out what time of year the sites were used.

"I'm looking for who lived there, when they lived there, what they ate and if they grew crops," Seymour said.

As for the more modern areas to the north, such as the caretaker's ranch and the houses that protected the springs, Seymour will learn as much as he can from what he finds then restore the structures.

He has finished the Big Spring house and is beginning to work on the ranch site where the dilapidated barn and chicken coop are.

It's a delicate process where he uses as much of the original materials as possible and does only enough work to make the buildings structurally sound.

If future archaeologists want to do more restoration later, they will be able to do so. It's better to add more later than to add too much right now, he said.

Trails and boardwalks will carry visitors throughout the preserve but will avoid direct contact with the older cultural sites, Seymour said. However, history and artifacts gleaned from them will provide information for the interpretive displays.

Not finished

Seymour says much of the actual digging could be completed by opening day 2005, but the historical analysis won't be finished.

"We have to relate it to everything else in the area," he said. "It's kind of like one of the pieces to a puzzle here in Southern Nevada. The history of water in Southern Nevada begins here, but it relates to travelers from Salt Lake City to the Los Angeles area."

A map showing the preserve's basic design concept already has been approved. Now it's up to a 40-member battalion of architects, landscape architects and experts in the planning of museums and exhibit displays to figure out what kinds of programs and buildings will be needed.

They have been meeting twice a month since last summer. Some of the team members are locals while others are nationally acclaimed experts, such as Mark Hamm of Seattle's Portico Group.

The environmental focus and the land-based nature of the project is what Portico executives found most interesting, Hamm said. The firm has done several indoor children's museums but also is working on designs for Turtle Bay Exploration Park in Redding, Calif., and an arboretum at San Francisco's Golden Gate State Park.

Las Vegas' project is similar to those with one important twist.

"The susceptibility of the Mohave Desert is unique," Hamm said.

Whatever they come up with will emphasize the wild and natural features of the place, Davis said. This concept was adopted last year after three dozen public workshops in which residents described what they wanted.

"We literally got suggestions from, 'You should wrap it in razor wire so they don't put a Starbucks up,' to, 'You should make an EPCOT out of it with a monorail through it,' " Davis said.

Littell expects the schematic design team to finish its work by October. When those plans are final, the various buildings and projects will be opened for public bid.

Once it opens, the preserve will need 2,000 to 4,000 volunteers each year for tours, interpretive programs and other duties, Littell said. But she's not worried. People already are calling to volunteer, and Littell is keeping a list.

Davis figures ongoing support will come easily after people start visiting the place. It is daunting, he says, to stand among the cottonwoods and imagine what thirsty travelers felt and thought as they stumbled upon the lush grass and cool springs after traveling for days across the vast, parched country.

"I don't think a lot of people really know why people stopped here in the first place. This is our Plymouth Rock," the water district spokesman said. "It has stayed the same for 100 years while everything around it turned to asphalt and stucco."

Susan Snyder

is a staff writer for the Sun. She can be reached at (702) 259-4082 or by e-mail at snyder@lasvegassun.com.

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