Rain gardens are suffering from an identity crisis.
On one hand, there are homeowners who love rain gardens composed of feathery grasses and bushy native shrubs. They even hire landscapers to install them and post signs to let others know that their yard is helping solve the problem of polluted runoff. There are Puget Sound databases and maps packed with examples of the water-sponging plantings. Walking tours in Portland and elsewhere showcase the green landscaping approach.
On the other hand, there are some small, but vocal, clusters of residents opposed to rain gardens that have been proposed for public spaces adjacent to their homes. They invoke the “Ballard rain gardens” — a local shorthand referring to some rain gardens that the city of Seattle installed in parking strips that failed to drain properly and filled with water. (It’s worth noting that the infamous gardens have now either been rebuilt or removed to the apparent satisfaction of residents: The blog Ballard Raingardengue launched to track the offending gardens went quiet a year ago.)
So what is the true nature of Northwest rain gardens? Are they an attractive, affordable tool to shrink the amount of fouled stormwater runoff that damages local lakes and streams? Or are they an infrastructure folly that doesn’t deliver?
A proposal to build rain gardens in the West Seattle neighborhood near the Barton Pump Station has resurrected the Ballard woes and the arguments against the roadside landscaping. The plan for Barton is being led by King County, which wants to build the gardens along roads to reduce the amount of stormwater runoff and raw sewage waste that spills into Puget Sound. The rain gardens are favored as a more cost-effective, environmentally friendly alternative to building bigger treatment plants and holding tanks.
Some of the Barton neighbors are lobbying against the plan. They have sent a letter to King County Executive Dow Constantine making their case, and are urging others to join them. One of the residents was kind enough to share the letter with me. I’m a homeowner, and I understand their concerns. Houses are monstrous, scary investments. The idea of a landscape project gone wrong being parked outside your front door is a nightmarish.
However, after looking through the concerns about the project, it seems most of the worries are largely unfounded, and many are echoes of fears raised in Ballard that never came to pass. Let’s take a look, point by point.
Ballard rain garden during a March storm, by Lisa Stiffler.
Kids will drown in the standing water: Rain gardens are typically shallow depressions, about 6-12 inches deep. Rarely do they hold water for more than a few hours. Toddlers admittedly are at risk for drowning in water that’s surprisingly shallow. But keep in mind the rain gardens proposed for Barton are roadside rain gardens, which means they’re right next to a ROAD with moving cars. When my daughter was a toddler, I didn’t leave her unattended in my fenced-in backyard, let alone playing unsupervised in a parking strip along a road.
Mosquito breeding ground: Mosquitoes can successfully reproduce using water that’s been standing for more than three days. The Barton rain gardens are being designed with underdrains that, should a real gullywasher fill them up, will speed the draining of the water.
Keep in mind that Washington doesn’t even start worrying about West Nile Virus until about June, which is when the state Department of Health starts its monitoring program. That’s also about the time that Washington begins getting less rain, which means there’s very little chance of standing water in the rain gardens during the summer’s mosquito season. More likely bug breeding spots are birdbaths, the dishes under flowerpots, and clogged gutters that don’t drain at all.
Also note that the vast majority of Washington’s West Nile cases have come from the Eastern side of the state, and the number of infections has been on the decline. Last year there were zero human cases in the state.
Sidewalk pavers run alongside a Ballard rain garden, by Lisa Stiffler.
Steeply sided rain gardens are hazards to elderly, young, and disabled: It’s true that a drop off on the side of the road could present a danger. But the plans for Barton don’t suggest the gardens will be steep or deep. The Ballard rain gardens are neither, and there’s a strip of pavement between the curb and plantings that people getting out of cars can step onto (see photo).
Standing water will attract rats: Again, the water won’t be standing for long. And this is a city laced with streams, pocked with lakes, and riddled with dark and hidey storm drains. If I were a rat, I’d opt for a more secluded drinking spot than a roadside rain garden.
Designs call for trees planted near sidewalks: The worry here is that newly planted trees will be too near sidewalks, causing root damage and making sidewalks treacherous for walking. I haven’t seen the species list for what will be planted, but it’s easy to choose trees less likely to harm pavement and residents should encourage the county to pick carefully.
Loss of street parking concerns: Residents fear that the loss of some parking spaces will disrupt driving patterns and force people to park farther from their homes, and this is probably true. They also suggest that there will be more car break-ins when people park farther from home, but no research is offered to support that.
Homeowners will be sued if the rain gardens hurt people: The rain gardens are on public property. I’m unclear on how a homeowner would be liable, and have not seen any citation of a case where a homeowner was sued over an injury in the public right-of-way.
Striped sign marks rain garden for drivers, by Lisa Stiffler.
The rain gardens and associated signs are ugly and will “ruin the beauty and quality of life in our neighborhood”: While many people prefer the plantings, some folks clearly love the simplicity of grass and won’t like rain gardens no matter how they perform. The ugliness of the signs, likewise, are a matter of opinion, but they strike me as pretty unoffensive (see photo).
Rain gardens will reduce property values: The only local, data-based research on rain garden economics available indicates that they actually increase property values by 3.5 to 5 percent. Opponents to the Ballard rain gardens said they talked to some real estate agents who claimed the plantings reduced property values, but there’s no information about how many agents were queried or how they calculated the devaluation.
Poorer neighborhoods are being targeted for the projects: Barton was chosen for the rain gardens because there’s a problem with sewage overflows in the area, and because the soils were suitable for draining water. Historically and regionally, rain gardens have been seen as street improvements and a desirable improvement.
Soils are the same as Ballard, and underdrains will clog: King County is doing extensive upfront testing in Barton, including more than two-dozen groundwater monitoring wells and eight test sites for how quickly water soaks into the soil.
The Ballard project was an anomaly. The city fast tracked the rain gardens to take advantage of cash offered through the federal stimulus program, and officials admit they made shortcuts that wound up backfiring. They cut short pre-project testing so they didn’t discover underground springs that seeped into the rain gardens causing them to fill up even in the absence of actual rain. The soil was worse in spots than expected.
Using underdrains at Barton will relieve any overfilling, should it occur. There’s no reason to believe that they’ll clog, and if they do, they can be cleaned. The county needs this infrastructure to work to meet obligations to clean up sewage spills, they need for these gardens to work.
Illustration of a rain garden with an underdrain, from King County.
The underdrain design is untested technology: Underdrains are a basic feature for many rain gardens, and often included in larger projects. The specific design of the Barton gardens might be unique, but that’s exactly what you want. A fundamental principal for creating effective rain gardens is to make sure the size, soil, plantings, and orientation are well suited to the location and purpose of the garden.
The only example of rain garden “retrofits” are in Ballard: Most rain garden projects are retrofits, which just means they’re constructed in already developed neighborhoods. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of these projects in the Northwest alone. Unfortunately and unfairly, the countless working rain gardens have fallen into the shadow of Ballard.
A couple of examples that are top of mind include projects in south Seattle that consultant Cari Simson has managed. One was a roadside rain garden retrofit at Markey Manufacturing near the Duwamish River, a project that has beautified an industrial street and eliminated massive puddles.
“Those are performing amazingly,” Simson said. “This is an industrial business. The owners never would have imagined they would be on the forefront of green infrastructure.”
More recently, Simson helped a group of neighbors in Georgetown install rain gardens on a residential block of South Orcas Street. The 1,375 square feet of roadside rain gardens now front six homes.
Residents liked that they wouldn’t have to mow their roadside lawns anymore, Simson said. “There was a lot of enthusiasm.”
Rain garden in Seattle’s original SEA Street project, by Lisa Stiffler.
There are other Seattle examples, as well as projects in Puyallup, Portland, and Gresham that come immediately to mind.
County and city won’t maintain rain gardens: This is a tricky area. In Seattle, the Department of Transportation is responsible for the public right-of-way, which includes the planting strips between the road and sidewalk. Residents have to get permits to do extensive work in the strip, such as removing trees, installing raised garden beds, or paving. While roadsides are public property, residents generally are expected to maintain them so that plants don’t spill out into the street or become heaped with trash. But rain gardens admittedly fall into a sort of gray area. Neighbors are right to ask county officials for a clear explanation of what sort of maintenance support they can expect.
Rain gardens will require more fossil fuels that conventional stormwater solutions: Building extra sewage treatment capacity and more storage vaults for polluted runoff, or laying new pipes to separate stormwater from sewage seem like fairly greenhouse-gas intensive projects relative to installing rain gardens. But I haven’t seen data to show which approach would produce more carbon dioxide, so that question is unresolved.
Reining in rain garden fears
Clearly, some of the Barton neighbors are genuinely worried about these roadside rain gardens, and have made a serious effort to compile their concerns. But digging deeper into their objections, most are overblown. Experience, research, and examples from around the Northwest show that rain gardens can and do work most of the time.
Ballard roadside rain garden “no parking” sign on flipside of striped sign, by Lisa Stiffler.
Admittedly, there were concerns that I couldn’t speak to, namely those related to long-term maintenance and existing water challenges, and I’d encourage folks from King County to weigh in here with comments if they’d like to. Likewise, if residents near the Barton project have more to say or feel I haven’t accurately portrayed their concern, I hope they comment as well.
Overall, the county is moving slowly on this project, giving lots of opportunity for public input, and making the whole process admirably transparent.
I hope that residents worried about what’s being proposed will go visit the Ballard rain gardens and see how they look and perform in person.
The gardens proposed for Barton and elsewhere are part of a broader effort to recover the health of Puget Sound, an effort that’s going to require residents to change how they live, work, build, and play in Western Washington if it’s to succeed.
David Hymel
Great story on rain gardens, Lisa, and you did mention rain garden projects in Puyallup. One neighborhood there is so enchanted with rain gardens that they are leading the effort to totally their community into a Street of Green http://raindogdesigns.com/wordpress/?page_id=1877
Bob Lecoque
It always amazes me that everyone can remember a bad happenstance but the positive results tend to be forgotten. I will admit that I was skeptical about the rain garden concept especially in our industrial area and proximity to the Duwamish River. The ground water is high, there is NO storm drainage infrastructure in the area and the terain is flat with little grade toward the river. The raingarden concept ended up being the only option that all parties (including the city of Seattle)could agree upon. Our rain gardens have worked flawlessly now for over 3 years, even in the heaviest of rain storms. Even during the wet winter months we do not have deep standing water and the rest of the year they are dry. The episode in Ballard is a shame but, it was caused by poor execution rather than a poor concept.
BluSkies
Here’s the problem with the Raingardens in Ballard. I live within a 4 block radius of where the gardens were put in. There was a huge construction project, in several locations and several streets, in Ballard, that took out sidewalks, tore up the street, took out parking and driveways, then put had consultants and professional landscapers come in and buy expensive plants/plantings. This was done at least 8 different times, over and over! I heard (because I know the landscapers,) that it has cost well over $1 million to try to Fix This Mess!! What a waste of resources! And it isn’t even done. They continue to take it out, do it again, plant more plants, over and over!. Some areas were simply cemented over. It is just horrible. So much wasted money!!
Lisa Stiffler
Thanks, BluSkies, for some direct Ballard input. That project has definitely been an embarrassment for the city, and it’s been expensive to fix (in reporting I’ve done the city said it was $500,000 to make the fixes; I’ll try to find out if that’s changed). When I toured the gardens last week, the ones that remained that I saw seemed to be working well now, at least.
UPDATE, 4/4/12, 6:49 p.m.
I decided to visit ALL of the Ballard rain gardens this afternoon to check on what was happening with them right now. Work has clearly stopped, and been stopped for a while. Some of the rain gardens that originally had standing water have been filled in and replanted with grass. It also looked like one or more of the bulb-out gardens was removed and the roadway was returned to pavement.
Most of the rain gardens remain, and the vegetation appears to be healthy and spreading, and there was no standing water to be found.
thomas cappiello
I wonder how much it cost when the Columbia blew up. We should never had proceeded with Shuttle program after that. What a waste, and an embarssment. Now thousands of people are cheering as the retired and obsolete objects go by, and will spend thousands if not millions a year to go see their decrepit carcasses. There’s no end to examples of human failure- does that mean we should just shut down our progress as a society everytime we make a mistake? Jeez.
Pam Emerson
Is there any way this could be reposted on the West Seattle blog? That blog has been amplifying the “anti” voices. I’d love to see them publish your response. Maybe they’d be amenable?
Thanks for this thoughtful piece!
Eric Hess
Hi Pam — I sent this article to the editor there, but I don’t think that they’ll repost. It might help if others send a note, too: editor@westseattleblog.com.
Tracy Record, WSB editor/co-publisher
WSB – which is not a “blog,” but rather an award-winning news publication (just honored last week by the King County Municipal League for “Government News Reporting of the Year”) – has not “amplified” anything, on this issue or anything else.
Yes, we reported recently on the neighbors’ concerns. If people who live in an area about to be affected by a major public-works project have something to say about it, that’s news, same as what the government agency working on the project has to say, and we’ve amply reported on their explanations/reassurances/etc. for more than a year. (We’ve been covering West Seattle’s two CSO-control projects for more than two years, dating back to before King County even announced their preferred solutions.) A few stories from the archive:
http://westseattleblog.com/?s=barton+raingarden
Nothing personal to Sightline but WSB does not republish stories from other sites, nor do we publish advocacy material of any kind – we don’t even do editorials/endorsements of our own. Any West Seattleite with something to say on the issue (or any other!), though, is welcome to start a new discussion in our Forum: http://westseattleblog.com/forum
Thanks.
Ed Stegall
Please come to Orcas St.in Georgetown and look at our swales before making up your mind. They’re working perfectly, and they’re beautiful. At the 700 block intersection, we used to have a massive overflow into the street drains and runoff issues in heavy rain. Now that’s gone, and the rain gardens absorb the extra water within an hour or two.
It adds to the street, and takes some of the edge off the nearby industrial section. It was well worth the weekend work.
Another Ballard Resident
Lisa:
A critical point of clarification (I was also involved in the Ballard Raingardens). While the City of Seattle did “fast track” this project, the reason they did is because they had this project on the “drawing board” long before the loan/grant from the Feds via the State came through. Remember the term “shovel ready?” And, the City did know about the till and the low infiltration rates, even though the infiltration tests were done when the soil was dry, rather than saturated which is BMP for engineers. In other words, even dry, the soils did not infiltrate according to the BMPs of rain gardens. I think, rather than dismissing the concerns of residents in any neighborhood, we should examine whether rain gardens in the PNW are a good idea to solve or mitigate CSO issues. If the goal is to prevent untreated sewage from entering Puget Sound, perhaps we need to rely less on so-called “green” technologies (which may work well in Maryland but may also be geographically challenged) and a little bit more on infrastructure (which if it works is green, in other words, it prevents untreated sewage from entering the Sound) which will actually address the CSO problem over a longer time period. Rain gardens are a great idea, but may not be the best idea every where. And listening to local knowledges, people who have resided in a neighborhood for a long time, is also a good idea. Remember? We like local!
Lisa Stiffler
Thanks, Another Ballard Resident. A year ago, I spent a day with Nancy Ahern, deputy director for utility-systems management for Seattle Public Utilities, the department that installed the rain gardens, and Chris Woelfel, project manager for the rain gardens. We toured the Ballard gardens and reviewed what went wrong.
Woelfel explained that they dug 19 test pits, 8×8 feet and 4 feet deep, to test how fast they’d drain. The range was 0.2 inches/hour to 3-4 inches/hour. I’m not sure whether this was during wet or dry weather.
Talking to SPU for stories I wrote about the rain gardens for the P-I and Crosscut, they explained that the main issue was with shallow ground water that filled the rain gardens.
My understanding is that while the rain gardens were indeed on the drawing board, that doesn’t guarantee that they would have been built if the process hadn’t been sped up due to stimulus money. With more time to evaluate the sites, it seems plausible that the problems could have been detected and the gardens either removed from the project or built with underdrains to reduce the problem. Does it make sense that they would have built them knowing they wouldn’t work?
I hope that I wasn’t simply “dismissing the concerns of residents” — I tried to go carefully point by point through the issues raised, and acknowledged areas where the residents were right, or where I didn’t have a clear answer.
The question about the role that rain gardens should play for addressing CSOs is a great one. And we’re already doing exactly as you propose. The vast majority of sewage overflow reductions are being made with traditional infrastructure. The use of green solutions such as rain gardens is very limited. I think the jury is out as to whether green solutions can carry a significant amount of the load when it comes to CSOs. But conventional CSO fixes are often so incredibly expensive, it makes sense to test whether rain gardens and other green tech can make a cost-effective contribution. Portland, like Seattle, is trying to figure this out.
Even the most staunch rain garden supporters would agree with you that this infrastructure is not appropriate for every site. The key is finding the right locations and right designs.
Andy Bookwalter
We live on Orcas Street, and were part of Cari’s rain garden project. We’ve been very happy with our swale, and I can report that the storm drain that used to routinely back up has been clear and largely empty all winter long. I haven’t seen more than an inch or two of standing water, and it’s never lasted longer than an hour or two. I would recommend checking out the SEA Streets project in North Seattle to see a mature, large scale rain garden project. http://www2.cityofseattle.net/util/tours/seastreet/slide1.htm
Zsofia Pasztor
Great article!
I would like to add to the list of projects the Everett rain garden pilot project where 7 systems were installed last fall. All of them use different solutions, some have underdrains and one is an infiltrating bog garden. The soils are very much clay, the plants are still very small, yet the water drains well in every one of the sites, even in the bog. The city opted for the rain gardens to help their CSO problems. The flooding issues were eliminated by using the rain gardens at a lower cost of what other solutions would have been.
The project partners were the City of Everett, Snohomish County Conservation District, Stewardship Partners and Innovative Landscape Technologies.
Diana G
Thanks for the great article and helping address many issues that people may have over rain gardens! it always nice to have facts, instead of relying on rumor when commenting on how changes will affect a community.
Cari Simson
Here is an excellent video produced by PBS/KCTS about Stewardship Partners’ Delridge rain garden cluster: http://video.pbs.org/video/2174860229
This clip features residential rain gardens being built, not the roadside versions that are going to be installed in West Seattle, but the video does a great job dispelling some of the fears and myths about rain gardens.
Bonnie C
Overall, this article is exactly what the interested public needs to read. I have experience in Public Involvement. A process designed to bridge the gap between the Agency and the Public. Getting the two parties talking with the common goal of understanding and resolution is how the concerns are addressed and put to rest. I hope, like you, the concerned folks take the time to read it. Good Job!
HOWEVER, I find the following to be contradictory and believe it could use some clarification:-
–Homeowners will be sued if the rain gardens hurt people: ‘The rain gardens are on public property. I’m unclear on how a homeowner would be liable, and have not seen any citation of a case where a homeowner was sued over an injury in the public right-of-way.’
–County and city won’t maintain rain gardens: ………While roadsides are public property, residents generally are expected to maintain them……
And just one criticism – The Rain Garden Signage. Really? This yellow and black striped marker tells the public there is a rain garden there? I would never know that. And while I wouldn’t say it’s ‘ugly’ it isn’t the most attractive sign; especially one intent on marking an otherwise attractive feature. The ‘water filtration’ signs I have seen placed in small man-made areas resembling wetlands are more attractive and are lower profile. They actually say what the site is. This sign doesn’t do that. It looks more like a hazard marker.
Lisa Stiffler
Bonnie C — Thanks for calling me out on the liability and responsibility question. I need to find a legal expert to help me unravel that — any volunteers out there? What I do know is the parking strip is public property, but that residents are legally allowed to plant and garden on it, with definite limitations (e.g. you need a permit to cut down a “street tree” or build a raised gardening bed).
On the striped signs, they are in fact there to denote a driving hazard. They’re placed on rain gardens where they “bulb out” into the road, making the driving space more narrow. Hope that clarification helps.
Bonnie C
Ahh. So it really is just a ‘hazard’ warning. Not a ‘rain garden’ sign. Thanks for clarifyng that one.:)
Yes, that liability question is a catcher. Where I come from, homeowners were in fact responsible for maintaining the parking strip betwen the curb and the sidewalk. Even the trees that were planted by the local municipality. And if those very trees disturbed the safe use of the sidewalk, the homeowner was responsible for repairing the sidewalk….and liable. Never did seem like a fair deal.
Marcia Denison
Are people in the Seattle area so used to concrete they are affraid if they walk on soil their legs will break and their kids will choke to death?? These gardens are gorgeous. We need more nature, please. Humans get wierd without it.
Doug MacDonald
This is actually a terrific article and I couldn’t agree more with most of the points Lisa is correct, however, in suggesting that the maintenance issues do need further discussion, given paltry maintenance budgets and hugely over-extended SDOT manpower and money resources against vast needs. But there is one curious omission in the discussion: Isn’t all this runoff highly toxic? A toxic soup, I think. If the runoff is so highly toxic, why should it be sitting in mid-street near houses and sidewalks, even for hours, let alone a day or two? Can you have the “toxic” argument both ways? And is there or is there not an expectation that raw sewage will be in the runoff? If there is, as a matter of public health protection it shouldn’t be stored in the street.
Eric de Place
Doug,
I must be missing something: why would there be raw sewage in the runoff captured by a roadside rain garden?
Doug MacDonald
That’s what I’m wondering, too.
From the intro to the research project that this article is part of:
“Stormwater—the rainwater that carries toxic pollutants off roofs, pavement, and yards—is a daunting challenge. It poisons waterways and kills salmon, causes erosion, and fills Northwest basements with smelly sludge.”
And from the article itself:
“The plan for Barton is being led by King County, which wants to build the gardens along roads to reduce the amount of stormwater runoff and raw sewage waste that spills into Puget Sound.”
And from the Anna Fahey Five Communications Tips:
Don’t talk about stormwater. Talk about “toxic polluted runoff.”
So it’s not surprising that there is a certain potential for confusion of image about what’s going to sit in those streetscape installations in the neighborhood.
The problem, of course, comes from letting the “messaging” trump a clear and sober delineation of the problem. This is not a point, as we all know, that I’m making here for the first time.
Steve Erickson
While the roadside stormwater runoff will have many pollutants, sewage isn’t one of them. The sewage concern arises because if the roadside stormwater runoff goes into a combined stormwater / sewage system, it can overwhelm the capacity of the sewage treatment plant to handle the combined volume of the stormwater and sewage together. When this happens, the “combined” overflow, including the sewage, bypasses the treatment plant entirely or moves through the plant too rapidly for complete treatment. A properly designed rain garden system will instead keep the stormwater separate and allow it to infiltrate into the ground, avoiding the problem in the first place.
Many municipalities around the the country are under EPA Clean Water Act enforcement orders to reduce or eliminate combined overflows. A treatment plant for even a small city of less than 30,000 people can cost upwards of $50 million dollars. In the PNW, building sewage treatment plants large enough to handle peak stormwater flows would be incredibly expensive. On the right soils, a shallow depression that allows the water to instead infiltrate into the ground is way cheaper, as well as providing the benefit of having living breathing plants that provide habitat for wildlife. Even urban wildlife!
As for the pollutants in urban stormwater, some such as copper tend to be immobilized in the soil at the bottom of the depression, since they are actually very small particles. The soil simply acts as a filter for these. Others (grease, oil) may be detoxified and broken down by biological activity in the soil. The key here is that these biological processes are not overwhelmed by too heavy a pollutant load. Over time, it may be necessary to remove the soil if some pollutants build up too much. Time will tell. However, the pollutant load in any given volume of water is relatively small. The problems arise from the sheer cumulative amount that is being flushed into aquatic systems and the sensitivity of some aquatic organisms to relatively low concentrations of the pollutants. This is one reason why its proving so difficult to deal with polluted stormwater runoff. There is just an awful lot of it. However, having several inches of this water standing in a depression for several hours near people is probably less injurious to them than having it flood a storm drain, stand in the street, splash on them when cars go by, or get concentrated in the food chain after it flushes out into Puget Sound and then later shows up on their dinner plate.
Lisa Stiffler
Thanks, Steve, for the well articulated clarification and explanation! I’ve meant to provide just such a reply, but have been off writing about other issues (if you want to learn about zoonotic diseases, I can help!).
Thanks for bridging the info gap, and thanks to everyone for such a thoughtful and respectful discussion, whatever your point of view might be.
Bonnie C
I live on clay soil.
Is installing a rain garden a practical option?
Steve Erickson
You need to measure how fast water will infiltrate through the bottom and sides, and design it to accommodate as much water as it will receive.
Brenton Clark
Another area where rain gardens are being tested out is Redmond. A couple summers ago I visited the LID demonstration project at Grass Lawn Park, which shows how rain gardens can interact with traditional infrastructure and other LID options (like permeable pavement) to reduce storm water surges and filter out toxins. It’s a great place to visit if you are interested in such things! http://www.ci.redmond.wa.us/Environment/StormwaterUtility/LID/GrassLawnPark/
John
Point By Point
–
Kids will drown in the standing water:
Children can and do die in mere inches of water. Kids do, as I once did, love to play in water, puddles and streams. Open water is an attractive nuisance. That is why fences and self closing latched gates are often code requirements for swimming pools. It is certainly possible and no one can guarantee that no one will drown in standing rain-garden water.
–
Mosquito breeding ground:
The designers of the Barton CSO make no claims on how fast the standing water will drain. But drainage is not the only issue regarding mosquitoes. If the rain-gardens are not regularly maintained by the county (and even if they are) litter and trash
that end up in the ditch will hold water just like clogged gutters
and flower pot dishes. Why add more habitat?
Safety issues arise if homeowners (some likely seniors) attempt to enter the ditch for maintenance and litter removal.
Anyone who has lived in Seattle knows that it does rain in June, a lot, with multiple day rain periods that will keep the smallest water vessels filled. What happens when the underdrains become full or clogged with the 15 million gallons they are expected to siphon off? Arguments about West Nile Virus not being present now are no indication of the future. It was not long ago that Washington had no West Nile threat. Now we do. Can anyone guarantee that West Nile Virus will not reach Western Washington?
–
–
Steeply sided rain gardens are hazards to elderly, young, and disabled: “It’s true that a drop off on the side of the road could present a danger.”
Right you are Lisa. And sooner or later some poor soul will likely stumble into this hazard, even if it is not “steeply sided.” Once again, no one can absolutely claim that this will never happen.
–
Standing water will attract rats:
Rats don’t require constant standing water like tadpoles or fish. But the rain-gardens temporary standing water and plantings provide excellent habitat and cover for rats. Indeed the water being flushed off of the streets into the rain-gardens will carry many food sources (litter, carrion & animal feces) to the rats living in the swales. If I were a rat, I would love to live in a safe place with plenty of water and food being served fresh from the dangerous street.
–
“Designs call for trees planted near sidewalks: The worry here is that newly planted trees will be too near sidewalks, causing root damage and making sidewalks treacherous for walking.”
Right again. If trees were so easy to select, then why have there been so many inappropriate trees planted by the city in the past? We have a long history of the city planting trees along planting strips with unforeseen consequences (damaged sidewalks, trees growing into power lines, insect feces pitting car finishes, branches and whole trees falling on cars and even killing people). Trees in the planting strip are required to be maintained by the property owner. Pitching sidewalks are also the responsibility of the homeowner. Seattle cites homeowners for this.
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“Loss of street parking concerns: Residents fear that the loss of some parking spaces will disrupt driving patterns and force people to park farther from their homes, and this is probably true. They also suggest that there will be more car break-ins when people park farther from home, but no research is offered to support that.” Once again Lisa shows her propagandist stripes with, “this is probably true.” Probably? No, absolutely true. And people in Seattle neighborhoods like Sunrise Heights have long been accustomed to parking directly in front of their homes. Sometimes they claim the street parking in their front yard to be theirs. Lisa makes no mention of access for seniors, infants or those bringing groceries home from COSTCO and having to carry them a block. As for car break-ins, does Lisa offer any research to support that more break-ins do not occur in the “hundreds, if not thousands, of these projects in the Northwest alone.” With all of those claimed projects, Lisa must have some data. Common sense, the police and insurance actuaries contradict this theory of no increased break-ins.
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“Homeowners will be sued if the rain gardens hurt people: The rain gardens are on public property. I’m unclear on how a homeowner would be liable, and have not seen any citation of a case where a homeowner was sued over an injury in the public right-of-way.”
In our system, anyone can sue for just about anything. The fact that you have “not seen any citation of a case” does not mean it has not or could not happen.
–
“The rain gardens and associated signs are ugly and will “ruin the beauty and quality of life in our neighborhood”: While many people prefer the plantings, some folks clearly love the simplicity of grass and won’t like rain gardens no matter how they perform.”
Nuff said.
They also take away the ‘pride of ownership’ that has traditionally been rewarded to those with manicured grass planting strips.
Few people praise the beauty of highly reflective yellow and black metal signs, but there is no accounting for taste and Lisa apparently likes street signs. Maintenance and replacement of the street signs is another issue. Vehicles regularly hit the same style sign on the bulb adjacent to my house. After the first few times, the sign just disappeared. Whose responsibility will this be, Seattle normally in charge of signs or King County?
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“Rain gardens will reduce property values:”
The study cited seems biased, is hardly conclusive and problematic. It appears to be a study designed to produce the results desired. Any block of street that gets rebuilt to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars may generate such marginal value for adjacent homes. Did the study include the troubled Ballard project? Did homes affected by the Ballard problems also see increases in value?
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“Poorer neighborhoods are being targeted for the projects: Barton was chosen for the rain gardens because there’s a problem with sewage overflows in the area, and because the soils were suitable for draining water.”
I believe Morningside Heights and Westwood were at least partially chosen because they are “poorer neighborhoods” with weak neighborhood associations and residents less likely to afford legal council and few if any city or county politicians living there.
Lisa’s other claim that this area was chosen “because there’s a problem with sewage overflows in the area, and because the soils were suitable for draining water” is just plain false. The problem of sewage overflow is caused by the entire area that feeds the Barton Pump Station (that is not close by as implied). The chosen site actually contributes a small portion of the storm water overflow in this system. Powerful, richer, politically connected neighborhoods of Fauntleroy, Fauntlee Hills, Gatewood, and the Beach Drive waterfront all drain more storm water into this area than the project site, yet they oppose even a pump station, much less letting the county into their planting strips.
Lisa’s claim that the “soils were suitable for draining water” is also false as the county has had to eliminate much of the potential project area due to unanticipated soil test results and the presence of clay.
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“Soils are the same as Ballard, and underdrains will clog: King County is doing extensive upfront testing in Barton, including more than two-dozen groundwater monitoring wells and eight test sites for how quickly water soaks into the soil.”
The issue is avoided. Is the soil similar to Ballards? Can underdrains clog? All of those ground monitoring wells will not prevent a problem and do not address each specific location. No mention is made of the fact that his area is a hillside with the street grid imposed on it. Most houses on the east side of streets are below street grade and already suffer drainage problems.
Of course there was no reason to believe that the Ballard project would fail when it was done, but it did.
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“The underdrain design is untested technology: Underdrains are a basic feature for many rain gardens, and often included in larger projects.”
Of course, that is why the Ballard project included such a “basic feature?”
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“The only example of rain garden “retrofits” are in Ballard: Most rain garden projects are retrofits, which just means they’re constructed in already developed neighborhoods.
Finally. I agree that Ballard is not the only retrofit. I question the claim of “thousands” of successful projects in the Northwest alone. Please provide data.
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“County and city won’t maintain rain gardens: This is a tricky area.” Right you are. The county has pledged to maintain the system. But by “maintain” they are careful to say the county will “maintain” the “performance” of the system. Such maintenance does not include maintaining the appearance of the system, all of the plantings that may need trimming, the garbage and litter in the ditches. The city just says the county will do the maintenance.
What happens when the county is faced with budget cutting? Does anyone believe that a cash strapped county will maintain the appearance?
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“Overall, the county is moving slowly on this project, giving lots of opportunity for public input, and making the whole process admirably transparent.”
Wrong. The county has not been “admirably transparent” in this process. It has mislead the community in regards to the percentage of storm water the neighborhood site contributes to the Barton Basin. They brought in City of Seattle reps for a public meeting to claim all the problems of Ballard were solved. They allowed many residents to continue to wrongly assume that their house drainage is included when the downspouts of homes will not be included. The county has not been transparent in providing the surprises of their test wells which reduced the available site area far more than anticipated.
Steve Erickson
“Lisa’s claim that the “soils were suitable for draining water” is also false as the county has had to eliminate much of the potential project area due to unanticipated soil test results and the presence of clay.”
In other words, the soils are not suitable because the county tested the soils in the project are and removed the areas that had unsuitable soils, leaving only the areas with suitable soils!!!!!!!
Really, most of the “problems” that the above poster lists could be solved easily and simply by simply paving everything and sloping it all downhill so the water runs off and becomes someone else’s problem.
Sunrise Heights Resident
While I am on the fence about this project, and find both weaknesses in Lisa’s article and the statement above, John has a great point on the last paragraph. The county has not answered problems about downspouts and why our neighborhood hasn’t been offered the same rebates as Ballard to improve our own property with cisterns, smaller rain gardens, etc. I have been waiting on an answer from the county for 3 months regarding the rebate program.
Also, I was originally told by Maryann Petrocelli that because the homes on our block are below street level, our block would be exempt. Maryann is mysteriously off the project and we have a new project manager from the county. Also, our block is now slated for a rain garden. The county only answered my questions about this over the phone (not in writing), which I find a bit interesting. To say that the county has been transparent with residents is definitely a stretch.
Lisa Stiffler
In case folks missed it, the independent journalism site Investigate West this week posted a great story about the Barton project and another rain garden project in Everett.
It goes into more detail on the plans to use “injection wells” (you can see them in the illustration of the project) and how they’ll send water deeper into the ground if the soils in the rain garden itself are draining slowly.
It also gets into the matter of maintenance (King County says it will maintain the gardens as they’re considered stormwater water “facilities”).
John
Lisa, I hoped you would respond to my post regarding your agitprop on the Barton CSO.
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The Investigate West piece has no investigation into the “talking points” provided by the Barton project team. It merely parrots them. By your recommendation, I read expecting to get details about “injection wells.”
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These are basically big deep wells that are now being needed to puncture and penetrate the thick impermeable clay that caps the neighborhood. “Now being needed,” is aimed at Steve Erickson’s twist of my words and meaning. The county panicked and had to order many more test wells when the first ones proved their infiltration projections wrong. After many more tests AND the addition of new “injection wells,” it is obvious that this area was not a good choice. No mention is made of what the 15 million gallons of polluted run-off being “injected” below this clay cap will do or where it will go. Obviously this amount of polluted toxic water (or any water) has never been “injected” under this cap. What about Longfellow Creek? The entire Barton Basin feeds the Longfellow Creek and the Delridge wetlands as will these new “injection wells?” Water flows down.
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Lisa, Investigate West does not get into the matter of maintenance other than accepting the quote given them by the county. Through the clever use of the word “facilities,” the county has confirmed my point above. An investigative reporter should ask the county to spell out what “maintenance of facilities” means and whether that is consistent to what neighbors’ are being led to believe (the point I made above).
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Steve Erickson does bring up an interesting point. He is right is in, “Really, most of the “problems” that the above poster lists could be solved easily and simply by simply paving everything and sloping it all downhill so the water runs off and becomes “someone else’s problem.”
That is exactly the current situation, only one small powerless community is being forced to shoulder all of the burden. That “someone else’s problem” is now solely Morningside Heights’. Investigate Week did not investigate the barely mentioned storage tanks so hotly opposed in the powerful richer neighborhoods, the very ones that contribute most (55% by the county’s figures)of the overflow.
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I live across 35th Avenue from the project site and my home and neighborhood will enjoy whatever relief provided by this project, but none of the real “costs” to those affected directly. This is just not fair.
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So far no one has really responded to my “point by point” response to Lisa’s piece. Why not?
Living in the 'Zone'
John-Thank you for your posts. They were spot on. It seems that any of the real monetary and time investments being saddled onto homeowners for maintanence, upkeep, accessibility, and safety were completely unaddressed. Instead the low hanging fruit of children drowning gets singled out.
Jeremy B
This article was incredibly useful! Our company is working on implementing rain gardens in our portfolio (customers have asked for it) so I stumbled upon this article through Google searching. Thanks for writing this!
Serena Larkin
Thanks, Jeremy. You can see more of our stormwater research in our Stormwater Solutions series, too. Thanks for reading!
Jess
Very interesting subject, they are doing some of the same things here in Minnesota. Even some Minneapolis Lawn Care
and Landscaping companies are building storm water gardens and other solutions to try to keep chemicals and other things from making it into the water. I personally am a fan of good water and the less we have to filter and clean makes for betting glasses of water for myself and my kids. As long as they do not breed mosquitoes in Minnesota
or pose danger to my kids then I am all for it.
Dean
Thank you for this information! My landscaping company has experienced lots of issues with sediment washing into the garden from surrounding surfaces. I’ve used a silt fence until the surrounding areas are secured via vegetation or paving.