Managing Wet Weather with Green Infrastructure. United States Environmental Protection Agency.
Green infrastructure is an approach to wet weather management that is cost-effective, sustainable, and environmentally friendly.

On a neighbourood scale, green infrastructure practices include rain gardens, porous pavements, green roofs, infiltration planters, trees and tree boxes, and rainwater harvesting for non-potable uses such as toilet flushing and landscape irrigation.

Prince George's County in the U.S.A. has a webpage devoted to best management practices for stormwater.

By intercepting runoff in bioretention areas near the source, the amount of the storm drainage infrastructure may be reduced, resulting in significant cost savings in site work. Several case studies have been performed comparing conventional BMP design to bioretention layouts. The results indicate that integrating bioretention across a site can achieve a net reduction of between 15% and 50% of the site development costs compared with conventional best management practices.”

Natural drainage systems (NDS) are an innovative alternative to traditional stormwater management systems. The pipes and ditches of traditional drainage systems carry runoff with traces of everyday contaminants such as oil, paint, fertilizer, and heavy metals directly into creeks, lakes, and Puget Sound. The speed and volume of water coming out of pipes erodes stream channels.

Natural drainage systems limit the negative impacts of stormwater runoff by redesigning residential streets to take advantage of plants, trees, and soils to clean runoff and manage stormwater flows. Vegetated swales, stormwater cascades, and small wetland ponds allow soils to absorb water, slowing flows and filtering out many contaminants

"The City of Portland is working with private property owners, architects, engineers and developers to explore methods of on-site stormwater management. Traditional stormwater management emphasizes putting runoff in a pipe to dispose of it. It’s an out of sight, out of mind approach that doesn’t take into account the fact that stormwater can be an asset when appropriately integrated into building and site design.”

See the online report
Integrating Stormwater into the
Built Environment
(external link)

The Green Infrastructure Guide - 2007
Issues, Implementation Strategies and Success Stories

"West Coast Environmental Law is BC’s legal champion for the environment. West Coast empowers citizens and organizations to protect our environment and advocates for the innovative solutions that will build a just and sustainable world".

Download the Green infrastructure Guide.

The Green Values Stormwater Toolbox
is a “green insfrastructure project” of
The Center for Neighborhood Technology (CNT).

This amazing website has something for everyone. Public utilities professionals can use the online calculator to estimate long-term potential savings of “green infrastructure” over traditional methods, while the “Green Solutions Manual” has a wealth of information and inspiration for homeowners and businesses.

The website makes a strong economic case for “greening” municipal stormwater practices.

HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE

Water: From Trouble to Treasure. A pocket guide to “Green” Solutions

This guide gives community groups, homeowners, and others practical ways to capture raindrops where they fall that are simple, affordable and can replace more costly conventional stormwater approaches. These green solutions include rain gardens, native vegetation, tree planting, rain barrels, and permeable pavement.

For professionals, there's the
The Green Values Stormwater Calculator,
which shows how green interventions can save money in the long term

The Greater Victoria Water Watch Coalition (GVWWC) is a coalition of organizations and individuals who, since September 2005, have been active to ensure water/waste water systems remain in public control.

Our position:
Water is a shared legacy, a public trust
and a collective responsibility.

We declare:
- Access to clean water is a human right.
- Ownership, management and operation
of water systems should be public.
- Conservation is vital.
- Water connects all life.

The Mount Newton Neighborhood Association (MNNA) is actively working towards solutions to "down draw" of wells on Senanus Drive (in northwest Central Saanich) during summer months. The MNNA is promoting rainwater harvest for nonpotable water needs, thus preserving well water for drinking. Rain harvesting is proposed as an environmentally friendly, local, and sustainable infrastructure alternative to piped municipal water. (It is feared that piped water could encourage/facilitate development that could potentially destroy rural lands and/or the environment.) The MNNA also advocates for the development of a local groundwater management strategy to minimize any water quality problems in the area's aquifer.

The information contained on this page will be updated as it becomes available.
Disclaimer: The CRD was supplied this information by local businesses and cannot be held responsible for discrepancies between the information in the table and information received when contacting these businesses. The information is intended to assist you in deciding where you would like to shop for your rain barrel.

The Capital Regional District has provided a list of local cistern suppliers - last updated April 2009.
Disclaimer: The CRD was supplied this information by local businesses and cannot be held responsible for discrepancies between the information in the table and information received when contacting these businesses. The information is intended to assist you in deciding where you would like to shop for your rain cistern.

Select any of the links for detailed information and photographs on the Innovative Rainwater Management Techniques found in the Capital Region:

North America's FIRST code-approved seismically engineered load-bearing insulated cob house features sustainable energy systems & rainwater harvesting from a living roof.

A wonderful source of information and inspiration.

Public tours are available (see website)

Although geared to Gulf Islanders, this website offers a wealth of practical information for the "urban raincatcher.” Lots of pictures, diagrams and links.

In 2004, the Islands Trust Fund installed a rainwater harvesting system at the house on the Ruby Alton Nature Reserve.

Project Urban Rain Garden was a Leadership Victoria class of 2006/2007 "Community Action Project" carried out by the team "Today's Stewards for Tomorrow" in partnership with Victoria West Elementary School.

Building the rain garden "demonstrated that there are progressive, achievable solutions available to address stormwater management. This project breaks down some of the obstacles other schools and communities may face in implementing similar actions, by providing a replicable and workable model to be disseminated in various formats, including a website."

Good overview of different types of rain gardens, siting, cost considerations and links to other websites.

Currently, there are no programs to engage and guide citizens in the creation of rain gardens on their properties.

Technology Brief: Rainwater Harvesting in Greater Victoria.

While outlining the prohibitive costs involved in rainwater catchment (when municipal water is so cheap), there are other benefits. Here's an excerpt:

“Rainwater systems that supply toilets and laundry would act as rainwater detention systems to eliminate more than half of the total runoff to storm- or combined sewers, and a significantly greater proportion of peak flows. This reduction could substantially reduce sewer overflows and winter peak flows through future wastewater treatment plants connected to combined sewers.”

These (and other) “benefits are not realized directly by property owners harvesting rainwater, but could be reflected in future pricing structures for wastewater, or incentives to install rainwater harvesting systems. The higher volumetric sewer rates that will be required to pay for the cost of wastewater treatment in Greater Victoria will strengthen the economic case for rainwater harvesting over the next 5-10 years, particularly where systems are installed at the time of building construction.”

Rainwater Harvesting at Ruby Alton House on Salt Spring Island
This "Owner's Manual" is an overview of the Ruby Alton House Demonstration project on Salt Spring Island. Written by local rainwater harvesting expert Bob Burgess, this 4-page manual gives practical advice for installing and maintaining a rainbarrel on your property.

ARCADE – Architecture and Design in the Northwest
Based in Seattle, Washington, ARCADE provides independent dialogue about design and the built environment and is published by the Northwest Architectural League, a not-for-profit educational organization..

See Winter 2009 issue - Water 2.0

Through demonstration sites that use best management practices (BMPs) to collect and treat stormwater onsite, TreePeople is advocating for a citywide system of cisterns and infiltrators to help capture stormwater runoff and recharge underground water supplies -- just like a mature oak tree does.

"Illustrated natural history posters to inspire, teach and encourage you every day"

Rain Garden Poster: depicts a beautiful west-coast residential rain garden.

Low Impact Living: a new poster field guide to green living (depicts a neighbourhood with on-site rainwater management)

Raingarden Handbook for Western Washington Homeowners June 2007
Washington State University Pierce County Extension

A homeowners’ manual on siting, designing, building and maintaining a rain garden.
Great pictures, clear illustrations, step-by-step directions, siting, soil considerations, and native plant lists, all of which (except for costs) are applicable to Southern Vancouver Island.

HarvestH2O.com is dedicated to the advancement of sustainable water management practices for individuals, families, communities, and businesses. FAQs, articles, resources, vendors, new products & news.

This is one of the best, most comprehensive sites on rainwater harvesting. If you want to know "the latest," keep an eye on this site for Doug Pushard's excellent and timely articles.

This "Owner's Manual" is an overview of the Ruby Alton House Demonstration project on Salt Spring Island. Written by local rainwater harvesting expert Bob Burgess, this 4-page manual gives practical advice for installing and maintaining a rainbarrel on your property.

The TWDB's Rain Harvesting page offers one-stop shopping for rainwater harvesting in Texas, including a accreditation programs for rainwater harvesting professionals. Tools for homeowners include:

- a rain water harvest “system size calculator”
- a detailed rain water harvesting map that shows average annual runoff from a 2,000 square-foot roof for any location in Texas.

TreePeople, Rainwater as a Resource: A Report on Three Sites Demonstrating Sustainable Stormwater Management. 2007.

Rain Gardens: Improve Stormwater Management in Your Yard

Includes guidelines/web links for choosing a suitable location, soil infiltration rates, slope, safety considerations, design, plant choices and more.

Rain Gardens: Improve Stormwater Management in Your Yard

IMPORTANT CMHC recommends that before digging any test pits or depressions in your yard, locate buried wires and pipes. Call your local service providers for assistance.

Also, see the CMHC webpage on
Downspout Disconnection

With significant combined sewer overflows in the city’s inner core, Kansas City launched program in February 2006. The program succeeds because it connects with people by tailoring the program to people who enjoy gardening and actively engaging homeowners, churches, businesses, non-profits and schools in a voluntary effort to reduce wet weather problems such as flooding, sewer backups and dangerous pollution of streams and rivers.

In Mt. Airy (near Cincinnati, Ohio), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is testing a "reverse-auction" method of encouraging the public to reduce stormwater runoff and pollution at the household level by installing rain gardens and rain barrels in their yards.

Homeowners bid the amount they wished to be paid for installation and maintenance of rain gardens and rain barrels. Low bids "win" and most people bid "zero" dollars

Neighborhood Level Analysis Of Rainwater Catchment In Portland, Oregon
This research paper "looks at intercepting rainwater off residential roofs and storing it in cisterns for indoor use as a way to mitigate stormwater problems," and concludes that "...rainwater catchment used for some type of indoor water use will reduce a household’s effect on the stormwater system and water supply, no matter the cistern size.”

Read the full study:
Neighborhood Level Analysis Of Rainwater Catchment In Portland, OR by Bradford J. Crowley – 2005

link courtesy of HarvestH20.com
“the online rainwater harvest community”

Through the Cracks: Impervious Surfaces in Greater Victoria

This brochure was produced by the Capital Regional District Roundtable on the Environment, a volunteer advisory board that reports on environmental trends in the Greater Victoria region of Southern Vancouver Island.

See a brief video on subsurface detention,
ABC World News –
L.A. Looks at Harvesting Rainwater

TreePeople's pilot project at an elementary school captures, filters and stores rainwater to irrigate a ballfield and keep pollutants out of the Santa Monica bay.
Length: 2:46 minutes
Released: March, 2005

SEE THE VIDEO
NOTE: this is an external link

In 2003, the editors of Cortes Island's website saw Barry Saxifrage’s vision of a “true” community website; a site where all the readers could be contributors to all parts and pages of the newspaper-like format. (Barry called this the “Tideline”, a place that is always in change.) They combined forces and the site became “cortesisland.com Tideline” - the flagship of the Tideline community.

The Cumberlander exists primarily to empower citizens with information and resources pertinent to the major issues of our time. It is here to help the village of Cumberland BC communicate with itself, and with the world.

Filled with a wide-ranging variety of grassroots news and views, the Cumberlander is a direct-edit interface open to the whole community. Freely post your own articles, photos, events, classifieds, letters to the editor, etc. from your own computer.

The Cumberlander's producer/editor, Dwayne Edward Rourke, would be happy to
help you implement Tideline software in your own community-of-interest, no matter where it is on planet Earth.

Contact Dwayne via The Cumberlander, or via his personal website www.dwayneedwardrourke.com or by phone (250) 336 2070.

The Vancouver Observer is a local alternative to dead tree journalism. "The newspaper is dying," Andrew Potter wrote in the April 7 issue of Macleans magazine. Eric Alterman said it like this in the March 31, 2008 issue of The New Yorker: The Internet...is about to pass newspapers as a source of political news for American readers. For young people, and for the most politically engaged, it has already done so. As early as May, 2004, newspapers had become the least preferred source for news among younger people. According to "Abandoning the News," published by the Carnegie Corporation, thirty-nine percent of respondents under the age of thirty-five told researchers that they expected to use the Internet in the future for news purposes; just eight percent said they would rely on a newspaper."

Tide Change is a project of a Comox Valley non-profit society called, World Community Development Education Society (WCDES), known locally as World Community. The web site that has been designed to connect people working on issues of eco-justice, social justice and democracy. We focus on community groups active in the Comox Valley, a region of about 65,000 people on Vancouver Island in British Columbia.