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"A River Runs Through It"
Fall 2025 - Storm Surge, rain flooding and ghost rivers
Fall 2025 - Storm Surge, rain flooding and ghost rivers
"A River Runs Through It" is the third of four murals I created for my year-long “Climate of Future Past” project. I originally created this project as the Washington Post Opinions 2025 Four Seasons artist in response to the newspaper's commission of four murals and four accompanying written opinion columns about climate impacts and seasons in Washington, DC. Unfortunately, the Washington Post abruptly cancelled the commission in September 2025 only weeks away from the start of this commissioned mural. The cancellation of the commission and my collaboration with the newspaper was the result of editorial changes at the newspaper spurred by the Trump administration's pressures on the newspaper's ownership. Despite the newspaper's cancellation of the collaboration I have committed to completing all four murals and publish all four opinions.
"A River Runs Through It" a 230' mural I painted with the Southwest community in Lansburgh Park, 1098 Delaware Ave SW, Washington, DC
Watch this short video of the community painting process
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A creek that nobody can see runs through Southwest, D.C. Residents drive, park and play on top of it and its vast floodplain. Even the people who live in or near the buildings and landmarks named after it often don’t know about its existence. To see James Creek, one must know which manhole to lift under which street of Southwest because for over a hundred the creek has been buried in a dark brick tunnel underground. The brook that once poured out from springs south of Capitol Hill and gently flowed down as a tributary to the Anacostia River is now out of sight, and on dry days it is a trickle more than a creek. However tiny, invisible and seemingly trapped underground this branch of the Anacostia River can still create risk for residents of Southwest. With intense precipitation and storms, James Creek, like most “ghost” rivers[1] - waterways that have been buried under human development - can re-emerge from its underground hiding and flood its floodplain with everything else in it. The James Creek floodplain – the natural “breathing” space that waterbodies need to expand and contract with seasons, precipitation and tides - still cuts through the now fully built out Buzzard Point peninsula and Southwest increasing flood risk for thousands of residents living several blocks inland from the floodplains of the Washington Channel and the Anacostia River.
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Whereas indigenous people thrived in these floodplains rich in fishing, oysters and wild rice, with the establishment of the Capital in colonial times, James Creek began to be treated as a nuisance to be managed rather than a resource to be protected, effectively turning its lush floodplain to undesirable land over the next two centuries. James Greenleaf, "the most important land speculator that the United States has produced"[1] and by 1794 the owner of “one third of the buildings for sale in Washington, D.C.”[2], owned so much land south of the Capitol that for a while Buzzard Point itself was known as Greenleaf's Point. The creek that run through Greenleaf's Point became known as James Creek after the same man. Today he is also the namesake for the local recreation center and park, the marina and one of the older public housing communities. However, James Greenleaf’s real-estate empire collapsed before he could see the land of Greenleaf’s Point developed.
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Community volunteers helping me painting this 230' mural. Volunteers included Southwest DC residents and local highschool students
Over the next century, the Capital developed north of the White House instead of south of the Capitol building as Greenleaf had bet, thus, leaving southwest and the Point mostly dedicated to farmland. As the Washington Arsenal expanded on the peninsula’s tip and the Navy Yard next door, farms gave way to weapons testing and industrial uses. By the early 1900s, the creek increasingly became a dumping ground for waste and industrial uses took over the southern portion of the peninsula. The perceived value of the land along the James Creek floodplain, thus, became tainted as less desirable than the rest of the Southwest quadrant. This became apparent in the planning decisions that followed the urban renewal project that resulted in the complete redevelopment of this quadrant of the city.
The urban renewal project, the first and largest in the nation, leveled 99 percent of buildings in the Southwestern quadrant of the city and forced 4,500 African American families from their homes and businesses to make room for modern tower-in-the-park buildings for the expanding federal workforce to live in[1]. Over the following three decades the planned redevelopment of the Southwest quadrant prioritized the development of luxury and market-rate housing[2], leaving the James Creek floodplain to be redeveloped last and with a concentration of public housing and affordable housing projects. One of the most durable legacies of urban renewal in Southwest is that today the James Creek floodplain is home to one thousand units of public housing across three communities.
The urban renewal project, the first and largest in the nation, leveled 99 percent of buildings in the Southwestern quadrant of the city and forced 4,500 African American families from their homes and businesses to make room for modern tower-in-the-park buildings for the expanding federal workforce to live in[1]. Over the following three decades the planned redevelopment of the Southwest quadrant prioritized the development of luxury and market-rate housing[2], leaving the James Creek floodplain to be redeveloped last and with a concentration of public housing and affordable housing projects. One of the most durable legacies of urban renewal in Southwest is that today the James Creek floodplain is home to one thousand units of public housing across three communities.
This concentration of vulnerable populations in this invisible floodplain creates risk. One fortunate outcome of the urban renewal redevelopment approach of this portion of Southwest was the setting aside of space for three parks - Randall, Lansburgh and King Greenleaf Park - along the old creek’s route. This string of open spaces overlapping the creeks’ old bed has created an opportunity for planners and residents to work together to rethink these spaces and the streets connecting them through the lens of water. Could some of the natural functions of this floodplain to store stormwater be re-created by re-designing open spaces with nature? By redesigning the three parks and the streets that connect them into a network of blue-green infrastructure[1] and “sponge” parks – open spaces designed with nature to purposely absorb and store large quantities of stormwater and floodwaters - the District plans to increase the community’s resilience to flood risk[2]. The added bonus of the design process was the opportunity to work with the community on updating the spaces to be more responsive to the communities’ recreational needs when the community is not flooding. This is most apparent in the re-design of a portion of Lansburgh Park, the main sponge park in the community-wide network, which will feature a large central bio-swale with a nature and public art trail around it, as well as an expanded stage area for hosting popular local events like community picnics and concerts.
From left to right: FEMA 100 and 500-year floodplains in Southwest; the blue-green infrastructure network for Southwest developed by DOEE, Ramboll; the concept design for the Lansburgh Park sponge park. Source: https://doee.dc.gov/service/swresilience
While it will take a few years to fully implement the flood resilience plan, I decided to bridge that wait for park improvements by painting my latest mural, “A River Runs Through It”, in Lansburgh Park this past October. This mural is the third of my “A Climate of Future Past” series[3]. The park’s location over James Creek, and its future sponge park re-design, make it the perfect setting for a mural about the main climate risk for communities in the fall: flooding from storms. As for my previous two climate murals[4], the art location is significant as it is both symbolic of risk as well as the solution to that risk.
A River Runs Through It” is a tribute to James Creek and the communities that have lived and thrived in its floodplain for centuries.
The mural is painted along a 230’ long and about 7’ tall wall that separates the future sponge park area of Lansburgh Park from the noise (and the emissions) from the adjoining District of Columbia Motor Vehicle Inspection Station.
The mural is painted along a 230’ long and about 7’ tall wall that separates the future sponge park area of Lansburgh Park from the noise (and the emissions) from the adjoining District of Columbia Motor Vehicle Inspection Station.
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I had several goals for this mural. First, I had to figure out how to organize and compose the artwork on a wall so long and skinny. I used the long L shape of the wall, as well as its direction perfectly aligning with the shape of the peninsula, to design a landscape of the Southwest quadrant from the National Mall and the Tidal Basin, through the Federal Rectangle, Southwest and ending on the Buzzard Point. Secondly, I wanted the artwork to feel like a celebration of the entire Southwest quadrant of the city. For this, I selected about three dozen landmarks, buildings and historical figures that have left a mark on the area. These include a mix of national monuments and buildings as well as landmarks with more local significance. Additionally, I wanted the artwork to speak to flood risk and flood resilience, so the mural depicts the peninsula during a storm that revives James Creek and floods the floodplain and Lansburgh Park. The final goal for the artwork was to make the park feel more welcoming, large and open. Lansburgh Park was, unfortunately, designed to be surrounded by buildings, light industrial uses and walls, making the center of the park, where the “sponge” feature will be built, feel very enclosed and walled in. By painting plant forms, organic shapes and colors, I created the illusion of the park extending beyond the wall rather than ending with a wall. Thus, now the longest wall in the park blends into the rest of the landscape and making the park feel more open and bigger.
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Community volunteers helping me painting this 230' mural. Volunteers included Southwest DC residents and local highschool students
For the first time, I decided to paint a mural with the assistance of volunteers from the host community. This was a way to honor and recognize the long tradition of civic organizing in Southwest that is also a legacy of the urban renewal plan. Thus, to complete “A River Runs Through It” I worked with the local non-profit Good Projects and the SW Business Improvement District to recruit volunteers among residents and students. It took about 50 hours of painting outside over 6 days for 25 residents, the parks’ urban farmers, local highschoolers from Richard Wright High School, and staff from the SW Business Improvement District and the Department of Parks and Recreation, and me to complete it. The dedication, time and effort that residents and students put into the mural, the pride with which they created art for their neighbors, the community that was created, albeit briefly, through the project, are all reminders that building up a community’s social capital – the social networks that support the growth and resilience of a community – is also a very important but often forgotten piece of the climate resilience puzzle. At a time when extreme individualism reigns, it is a good reminder that individual resilience is often only possible within a resilient community.
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Community volunteers helping me painting this 230' mural. Volunteers included Southwest DC residents and local highschool students
“A River Runs Through It” was made possible with the generous support of the SW Business Improvement District. Other supporters include the DC Department of Parks and Recreation, Good Projects, Richard Wright Highschool and students, the Lansburgh Parks Farmers.