Our Coastal Community Development Advisor, Monique Myers has a fascinating job. Recently she has been working with local officials and emergency service professionals, mainly fire marshals, in an effort to lessen urban storm runoff.
What is the link between emergency service professionals and reducing urban storm runoff?
In an effort to conform to state and federal regulations requiring a reduction in volume and rate of urban runoff, communities are exploring ways to achieve these goals. One way to reduce runoff is to reduce the use of hardscape materials (hard surface like concrete and asphalt) in urban development design. Another way to achieve these goals is to reduce the runoff is to get the storm water into the ground. This can be achieved in a variety of ways including: porous asphalt and cement; infiltration landscape areas; wetland ponds and green roofs.
Emergency service professionals’ number one goal is to maintain the highest level of public service possible. This is the place were reducing urban storm runoff and emergency service professionals concerns meet. There is a concern that narrow streets that would reduce runoff would not be wide enough for emergency vehicles. In addition there are also questions about the ability of pervious cement and/or asphalt to handle the weight of an emergency vehicle. Landscape infiltration systems were of less concern to emergency service providers, but they did provide some insight and suggestions to minimize potential problems.
Many possible solutions and combinations of solutions are in progress as we work towards meeting regulatory runoff reduction requirements and maintaining the high quality emergency service response we have become accustom to. You can read the Low Impact Development Green Sheet about this project, including potential solutions, here. Additional Green Sheets by Monique can be found here.