Portland's sewers right as rain

By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY, March 28, 2010

 

The most surprising tourist attraction in Portland, Ore., is its storm sewer system.

 

Eco-friendly tourists flock to the city to understand how Portland's innovative system of curbs, gutters, roofs and rain gardens sharply cuts water pollution.

 

So popular is the "Green Streets" program that the city publishes a map on its website directing tourists to the most exciting storm sewer sites.

This stormwater issue is bigger than most people realize.  As it says in the article, the best way to deal with it is to let as much as possible percolate into the ground onsite.  All these detention basins out in new developments are terribly ugly and waste a lot of good land.  And the underground storage that is done in more urbanized areas is expensive and usally part of a surface parking lot. 

great idea. i know people who have inspected the system and were quite impressed.

I saw this yesterday and asked my brother (lives in Portland) about it.  He said he hopes Portland has more to talk about than this.

 

(he tried going through the program, but apparently his downspouts are too close to the property line so he has to do it himself if he wants to disconnect).

EPA proposes rainwater-trapping rules for D.C.

<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/21/AR2010042104929.html">Washington Post, April 22, 2010</a>

 

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced plans Wednesday to require "green roofs," rain barrels and other measures that trap runoff at new and redeveloped buildings in the District, making the city a test case for an ambitious effort to stop pollution from flowing into rivers along with the rain.

 

<a href="http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/0/ecf0fc0431afbf0b8525770c006ea74b?OpenDocument">The EPA press release</a>

We had a rep come to our office last fall to speak about permeable pavement streets.  They were brick streets that had a long lifespan, withstand plowing better than conventional pavements and absorbed most of the water.  This meant there was no need for sewers.  In fact gutters were added only to create an "edge" so vehicles wouldn't park on the grass.  If the bricks can be made of fly ash....even more sustainable. 

 

To top it off, the brick streets were incredible looking.  They also showed how quiet and smooth they were to bike and drive over.  It made me wonder what we are still messing around with asphalt for

Do you have a link to that company or product?

That sounds like it would be great for a driveway. Ours is a huge mess right now are we are facing the fact that it will have to be done eventually...we have potholes for crying out loud.

When they re-paved the alley (Comer Alley, between 14th and 15th Street) for OTR's "City Home" project they re-used the old alley bricks, but they used lots of pea gravel underneath and the intent is to allow the water to seep in between the bricks and into the soil.  I have been watching it, and it appears to work, and the alley looks great.  I have some pictures I will post here later tonight.  I plan on lobbying the city street dept to do the same thing to our alley.

Dense and Beautiful Stormwater Management

By Laurence Aurbach

<a href="http://pedshed.net/?p=270">Ped Shed Blog</a>

 

...We have the technical know-how to create neighborhoods that are both compact and green. But sometimes standards and regulations don’t recognize this, particularly stormwater standards. Well-intentioned stormwater standards and regulations can put compact urban development at a disadvantage. They may have the unintended consequence of promoting sprawl, which hurts watersheds more than compact development.

 

Unlike many barriers to compact development, this is not a technical, social, financial, or even political problem. It is largely an administrative problem. Doing the right thing is simply more difficult for administrators....

 

 

Here is my post on some permeable pavements in Cincy:

 

http://www.citykin.com/2000/01/permeable-pavements.html