Tule marsh

Find your way to a position in front of the beautiful mural on the south wall. In the not-too-distant past, the area around you was a marshland with small islets. Before the sidewalks and the train station and the overpass, this was the dominion of red-winged blackbirds and willets, cattails and endless expanses of tule marsh. The Xučyun people traditionally fashion the tule into swift, light watercraft, similar to most tribes surrounding the delta. While tule reed marshes were difficult for the colonists to navigate, kinship-based tribes navigated these aquatic systems with ease in these traditional tule canoes. Over time, this marshland was drained, diverted, and then re-filled for urban development. The sunken vehicle and street sign in the upper left of this mural provides the appropriate modern contrast to this beautiful traditional scene.