Volunteers are welcome to show up. Be sure to bring hat, gloves and water bottle, says organizer Barbara Newcombe.

Newcombe, an Oakland resident since 1985, became interested in tackling the over-grown stairway earlier this year, when she began attending local crime prevention neighborhood meetings.

"When places look cared for, it has been shown that criminal activity tends to decrease," says Newcombe. "At least that's what the police department representatives maintain. I think that makes sense."

With a background as a newspaper "morgue" librarian, Newcombe enjoys the challenge of research. "A few of us started 'digging' to see what we could come up with on the history of the stairway," she said.

Visits to the library history room revealed the steps' construction dates to the early 1920s, "the same year as my birth," recounts Newcombe, and replaced a section of Cleveland Avenue that had been determined by city engineers to be too steep for traffic.

City engineer and landscape architect Howard Gilkey, a young UC Berkeley graduate who as a youth had worked for, and been inspired by, famed horticulturist Luther Burbank is credited with designing the twin stairways.

"As our group of volunteers worked to clear away all of the overgrowth, we came upon another element of Gilkey's design that had been long hidden from view," said Newcombe.

Photographs on file at the history room reveal a cascade water feature, concrete bowls that captured water flowing down from the top level. Shell sconces, containing colored lights, which illuminated the flowing water at night, were part of the original construction.

"Our excavation work showed us the concrete bowls are now mostly missing, but enough pieces have been found that it would be possible to recreate them some day," says Jim Ratliff, another member of the friends group.

Ratliff is responsible for setting up a Web site that chronicles the group's efforts.

"We have been including articles we have been coming across in the history files," says Ratliff, "and we are especially interested to hear from anyone out there who has personal memories of the cascade, when it was fully operational."

It is still not known precisely when the cascade was turned off. "We think it might have been in the 1950s, or maybe in the 1970s, but we don't have all the information," says Newcombe. "Sooner or later we should be able to come across the original plans, and further documentation."

In the meantime, the group continues to hold regular cleanups and is working with a local landscape architecture firm, PGA Design Group, to develop a master plan for the site. "Chris Pattillo of PGA read about us in the Oakland Heritage Alliance News and offered to help," says Newcombe.

Emmanuel Donval of PGA "has really thrown himself into this project," says Pattillo. "With no source of funds identified yet, any ideas we come up with must be highly creative."

Now that the concrete foundation for the cascade has been largely excavated and the overgrowth cleared out, the remaining dirt and soil must be stabilized before the coming rains. "Burlap sheets laid atop the hillside, should do the trick," says Pattillo.

Next spring, the group hopes to begin planting replacement vegetation. "Emmanuel came up with the idea of using mulch made from recycled and ground blue glass material (resembling water) and stacked recycled motorcycle tires that can stand in as the containers.

"We then would use blue and white flowering plants with trailing foliage to stand in for the water flow."

"I am not sure if in my lifetime we will ever see water spilling down again through the cascade," says Newcombe. "But one thing is sure. The stair steps are more cared for now than they have been in some time and many, many people enjoy using them."

To learn more about this Oakland treasure, and how you can help in the restoration efforts, go to www.clevelandcascade.org. Volunteers or 763-4406.