What is Green Infrastructure?
Green infrastructure is made up of the interconnected network of waterways, wetlands, woodlands, wildlife habitats, and other natural areas; greenways, parks, and other conservation lands; working farms, ranches and forests; and wilderness and other open spaces that support native species, maintain natural ecological processes, sustain air and water resources and contribute to health and quality of life (McDonald, Benedict, and O’Conner, 2005).
Challenges will always persist when it comes to localities maintaining infrastructure. And we often only plan for “grey infrastructure” like bridges or streets. Green Infrastructure (GI), however, now has a growing importance in helping communities improve and sometimes reduce the need for additional grey infrastructure. It serves to work with natural ecosystems to preserve green space, clean air and manage stormwater. The City of Norfolk has been doing ground work, pun intended, as it relates to Green Infrastructure. Working with the Green Infrastructure Center has the Watershed Taskforce Team inventorying natural assets and identifying opportunities for their protection or restoration. This GI planning provides a chance for communities to approach land use in new ways that keep natural processes in mind.
Unlike most grey infrastructure, GI provides multiple community benefits. For example a protected wetland provides critical marine habitat while also managing flood waters and clearing up water pollution. Likewise a grove of urban fruit trees could help improve air quality while feeding those in need. With this mindset, it makes sense to maintain and integrate GI into the existing built environment and urban landscapes as a common sense approach for managing important environmental issues such as flooding, water quality and more.
Norfolk’s work with the Rockefeller Center has produced an upcoming Retain Your Rain workshop that will demonstrate parcel level stormwater interventions. To you and me, that means things we can do at home like rain barrels, blue/green roofs, planters, permeable pavement and cisterns that contribute to the overall GI of the community. The purpose of the workshop is to demonstrate how residential or private property owners can reduce stormwater runoff and flooding from rain events.
Retain Your Rain will be held Saturday, June 4th 3:00 – 5:00pm with a Resilience Party, Beer Garden & Flood Mitigation Project Expo at 142 W. Olney Road.
For more information on GI in Norfolk, contact Denise Thompson at [email protected].
Blog contributed by Lisa Renée Jennings, Public Service Coordinator with Keep Norfolk Beautiful.