Rain Garden information for Red Oak neighbors and all others Page 6

PLEASE CLICK ON PHOTO TO MAKE READING EASY.

Please see at least five older posts with photos from the park further down the list of archived files, with three in the month of August and the rest in September.

I truly believe that many people who live upstream from the Red Oak Park can be persuaded to participate in a project that would create rain gardens in private yards with gutter and downspouts sending water to the rain gardens and other lawn areas with absorbent soil.

A reasonable number of rain gardens and the use of rain barrels in addition could make it possible to reduce the loss of trees in Red Oak Park and allow Dave Evans to present a plan that would protect wildlife habitat and even provide more wildlife habitat without losing much shade and any of the facilities already in the park in his effort to slow erosion of the stream corridor that currently is subject to frequent, intense but short-lived flash floods.

The few people in the neighborhood whom I have talked to spoke encouragingly of considering such a plan. Please allow them a chance to see such a plan before adopting the Stream Team plan or totally rejecting it. Dave Evans of the Game and Fish Commission, Katy Teague of the Washington County Extension Service and Carole Jones of the city park department likely can offer ideas on potential cost for different sizes of rain gardens.

To eliminate dangerous runoff into the park under the largest storm conditions, of course, water would need to be diverted via curb cuts and possible other alterations of the storm-drain system to send water from the streets onto land where it could soak in. The good news is that the subdivision likely has enough absorbent soil under lawns to soak up more water than it gets now.

Gutters on every house to route water from rooftops to rain barrels and from there (when the barrels fill) to appropriate-sized rain gardens would be the first item, with water from patios and driveways and sidewalks routed to green space second. Then larger rain gardens on park property could be planned with the curb cuts and other relatively expensive infrastructure work considered last.

With cooperation of a reasonable percentage of property owners, much could be done at little city expense. If federal or state grants later were explored, some source of funding might be found to support the city's efforts in the area during this time of expected slow revenue growth.

As Mayor Coody knows from attending the creation of several rain gardens in Fayetteville, there is a coalition of experienced rain-garden volunteers who likely would help to train neighborhood volunteers to lead creation of the facilities in the watershed that sends water to Red Oak Park.

The potential saving of park facilities and shady greenspace for coming generations appears well worth the effort.

If such a project succeeds in what is probably the neediest piece of park property in the city, it will encourage more developers to submit projects with such features already included. And natural rain gardens such as World Peace Wetland Prairie on South Duncan Avenue are likely to be protected where they already exist on land slated for development because it costs nothing to leave them functioning, while a traditionally engineered stormwater plan is always expensive to build.

Sincerely,
Aubrey James Shepherd
P.O. Box 3159
Fayetteville, Arkansas 72702
aubreyshepherd@hotmail.com
http://www.aubunique.com
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7295307@N02/
http://www.aubunique.com/blog/
http://aubreyshepherd.blogspot.com/
479-444-6072