Hundreds came out to Confluence Park on Saturday, Oct. 24, to plant native trees along the shoreline of a rerouted Issaquah Creek.

According to Stewardship Director Tor Bell of Mountains to Sound Greenway, which organized the event, more than 300 signed volunteers and corporate teams planted the saplings of several arboreal species, including Douglas firs and red cedars.

“It seems like such a tradition here,” Bell said, speaking to the popularity of the event. “I’m always impressed by people’s care and compassion for the land. We have volunteering individuals, corporate groups … we had a small child here with a binky. It’s a rite of passage.”

The planting was the last step in the city of Issaquah’s multi-million dollar creek restoration project.

During the city’s industrial days, loggers and coal miners altered the creek over the years, “hardening” it with debris to alter its flow, Parks and Recreation Director Anne McGill said. But this had the effect of making the creek less hospitable to salmon returning to the Issaquah State Salmon Hatchery to spawn.

Parks and Recreation worked for decades to restore the creek, beginning with the acquisition of Margaret’s Meadow, the first piece of what would become Confluence Park, 20 years ago by then-Parks Director Kerry Ritland. During the summer, crews cleared the east fork of Issaquah Creek, installed in-stream logs and stumps and installed safeguards against soil erosion, among other alterations. The project was overseen by Kerry Ritland, Issaquah’s surface water manager.

“[Seeing volunteers planting trees is] a great feeling because it’s really the completion of this process,” Ritland said. “So, yeah, it feels good.”

The trees, when grown, will provide shade to the creek and keep the water cool for salmon fingerlings, Bell said. He added that their woody debris would also protect against soil erosion. Weeding will need to be done over time to ensure they grow unhindered, he said.

Though the planting marked the completion of work on the east fork of Issaquah Creek, more work remains to be done on Confluence Park.

Mayor Fred Butler has put construction of a bridge crossing the creek into his recommended budget for 2016, currently under discussion by the Issaquah City Council.

Butler, present at the planting, also noted that a lot immediately south of the creek fork would eventually be cleared to become part of Confluence Park, helping to make it a “place of quiet, peace and solitude,” he said.