A Green Infrastructure Vision coming to life

To kick off the tour and be reminded why protecting our natural resources is so important, we took a look around the Department of Natural Resources’ new Outdoor Adventure Center. This beautiful new facility allows each visitor an opportunity to go “Up North” without leaving Downtown.

– Mary E. Blackmon, Vice President, Wayne County RESA and SEMCOG Delegate

Adjacent wetlands are nature’s way of protecting our waterways from pollutants that stormwater carries into our lakes, rivers, and streams. Unfortunately, the Detroit River has lost 97 percent of its natural wetlands. At Milliken State Park’s green infrastructure demonstration area, we saw how a constructed wetland has restored some natural filtration to the river.

The Milliken State Park project stands out. It really helps to get a visual.

– Gwen Markham, Councilmember, City of Novi and SEMCOG Delegate

Detroit vacant lot under construction to be repurposed as bioretention garden

These things are so far out of the average person’s thinking, yet they demonstrate a real pragmatism.

– Jeff Jenks, City Commissioner, Huntington Woods and SEMCOG Chairperson

The next stop on our tour gave us an opportunity to watch green infrastructure construction in real-time. Fortunately, we had experts on hand to explain why this was much more than a big hole in the ground where a blighted house once stood. Once completed, the bioretention garden on this vacant lot in Detroit’s Cody Rouge neighborhood will allow stormwater from the surrounding road to infiltrate the earth for most storms.

Seeing these things up close really helps you to understand how they work. There are so many options.

– Kathy Vosburg, Commissioner, Macomb County, and SEMCOG Immediate Past Chair

The outcome of four new bioretention gardens in a pilot project led by the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department will help the City of Detroit to make important decisions on managing vacant land.

It is important to see how different solutions may fit different areas instead of trying a one-size-fits-all approach.

– Karl Tomion, Commissioner, St. Clair County and SEMCOG Vice-Chairperson

For the final stops on our tour, we visited the City of Southfield and saw some different examples of how to minimize pollution from stormwater by sending it into the earth instead of a sewer pipe.

Don Fracassi, Acting Mayor, City of Southfield

By simulating a storm event, City of Southfield Acting Mayor Don Fracassi and Stormwater Manager Brandy Siedlaczek demonstrated how porous asphalt in the municipal parking lot can enable water to filter right down to the soil without ever reaching the drain. Washtenaw County Water Resources Commissioner Evan Pratt discussed the importance of maintaining the asphalt to maximize its effectiveness while also explaining how much less likely it is to crack.

At Inglenook Park, we looked at an award-winning implementation that uses bioswales and pervious paving bricks to both beautify a parking lot and capture stormwater runoff.

Inglenook Park

Southeast Michigan is a large region composed of a diverse range of communities and lifestyles. One thing that ties us all together is our dependence on water as a precious natural resource. Maintaining our water infrastructure is vital whether we consider recreational activities such as swimming and kayaking, protection from flooding, or simply the quality of our drinking water.

Green infrastructure, much like our traditional water and sewer utilities, is an extensive system that relies on local innovation and regional cooperation to function at the highest level. Fortunately for those of us in the SEMCOG region, there is no shortage of leadership here to help us maintain and improve our quality of life. And, as we learned from seeing it in action, green infrastructure is one of the innovative tools that can help the region achieve a sustainable future.