Urban Harbors Institute and Division of Marine Operations Collaborate on Spectacle Island Restoration

By Jack Wiggin

On October 4, a team of volunteers removed over 20,000 feet of surplus irrigation pipe from the slopes of Spectacle Island for reuse by the New Entry Sustainable Farming Project in Lowell and Dracut, Massachusetts. UMass Boston’s Urban Harbors Institute (UHI) and Division of Marine Operations were among a host of public and private sector organizations that planned and carried out this latest mission to transform Spectacle Island into a showpiece of sustainable practices.

Spectacle Island is one of the thirty-four islands that comprise the Boston Harbor Islands national park area. The story of Spectacle Island is one of reclamation and restoration, an environmental “rags to riches.” Over the past decade Spectacle Island has been transformed from an abandoned, smoldering landfill for the City of Boston to a public park with a marina, a visitors and education center, and extensive and dramatic open space. Using over 3.6 million cubic yards of material excavated from the Central Artery/Tunnel project, the former dump was capped and the fill was used to create a park setting, complete with the planting of grass and thousands of trees, shrubs, and flowers. An elaborate irrigation system had been installed for watering the plantings. The Central Artery/Tunnel project and state agencies released the system when it was no longer needed on the island for donation to the New Entry Sustainable Farming Project.

The New Entry Sustainable Farming Project (NESFP), sponsored by Tufts University, supports development of small vegetable farming efforts of immigrants, mainly from Cambodia. Ethnic produce is grown for family use and is traded in local farmers markets and sold to some restaurants.

The idea to recycle the pipes originated with Bill Green, coordinator of the Subcommittee on Renewable Energy and Sustainable Design (SRESD) for Boston Harbor Islands. Bill had read the story of John Oganowski, the pilot of American Airlines Flight 11 that crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York. The article described John’s involvement with the New Entry Sustainable Farming Project, making his land available to the farmers and, as a fourth-generation farmer himself, becoming the first mentor to help these immigrant farmers.

Jack Wiggin, UHI assistant director, a member of SRESD, and part of the project team working to make Spectacle Island into a model of a sustainable park development, worked on the planning and logistics while Chris Sweeney and Russ Bowles of the Division of Marine Operations provided boat transportation for project reconnaissance and made the arrangements for transporting the volunteers to and from the island on Thompson Island’s vessel “Outward Bound.” The majority of the 85 volunteers were from State Street Global Outreach, YouthBuild at Community Teamwork, Inc. in Lowell, and NESFP.

According to Wiggin, “This was an exceptional example of both the creative collaborations and cooperation that are the key to the Boston Harbor Island national park area’s success and of the park’s commitment to environmentally sustainable practices.”

Spectacle Island is scheduled for public opening in the 2003 season. Building on the island’s theme of reuse and renewal, the new visitors’ center incorporates green building features, renewable energy installations, and all electric vehicles.

George Price, the National Park Service’s project manager of the Boston Harbor Islands, and Peter Lewenberg, special assistant to the secretary of the Executive Office of Environmental Affairs and former trustee of the University of Massachusetts, with a load of irrigation pipes atop one of the island’s electric vehicles. (Photo by Doug Welch, Island Alliance)

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