TECH TAKES
TECH TAKES
Integrating Nature: The Role of Green Infrastructure in Urban Planning
In this episode of Tech Takes, host Louis Savard investigates the importance of integrating green infrastructure technology in urban planning.
Louis is joined by Gail Willis, C.E.T., of Willis Technical Services. Gail is a Certified Engineering Technologist with extensive experience in civil and municipal engineering. Together they explore how communities in Ontario are embracing sustainable practices to manage storm water, conserve energy, and enhance resilience to climate change.
Join us as we learn how green infrastructure serves as a valuable tool in building sustainable and resilient communities.
Have a topic you’d like to discuss or comments about the episode? Reach us at techtakes@oacett.org.
Tech Takes Podcast – Episode 10
Integrating Nature: The Role of Green Infrastructure in Urban Planning
David Terlizzi:, 00:00.408, 00:49.51
Tech Takes Podcast is brought to you by Niagara College's Walker Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Center. From day-to-day support in our quality department to long-range new product plans, WAMIC is your competitive advantage. Learn more at ncinnovation.ca slash WAMIC. That's ncinnovation.ca slash W-A-M-I-C. This is Tech Takes, a podcast that explores the many facets of the engineering and applied science profession. It is brought to you by OACETT the Ontario Association of Certified Engineering Technicians and Technologists.
Louis Savard:, 00:49.516, 03:19.84
Hi, I'm Louis Savard, and welcome to Tech Takes. In Ontario, the emergence of aesthetically pleasing and sustainable communities has highlighted the growing importance of integrating green infrastructure technology. By focusing on water management solutions, promoting conservation, and enhancing resilience to environmental stresses, these communities serve as examples of how urban planning can effectively respond to urbanization and climate change challenges. In fact, the Province of Ontario's 2020 Provincial Policy Statement acknowledged green infrastructure as a necessary feature for building strong, healthy communities and has encouraged planning authorities to implement green infrastructure projects. The province recommends that green infrastructure projects complement the community's existing infrastructure and public service facilities to manage stormwater, save energy, improve air quality, and address climate change. Willis Technical Services in Thunder Bay is doing just that, offering innovative, sustainable stormwater management and green infrastructure design solutions to municipalities, enhancing their community resilience as climate change risks persist. Today, I'd like to welcome Gail Willis from Willis Technical Services' to Tech Takes podcast to chat about green infrastructure and community resilience in the face of climate change. Gail is a member of OACETT and a Certified Engineering Technologist with over 24 years of experience in civil and municipal engineering. She specializes in integrating stormwater solutions to meet regulatory requirements enhance community resilience, and protect natural habitats. Now brace yourselves, her expertise includes stormwater system analysis, hydrology, hydraulics, drainage, sustainability, green infrastructure, and community development, including road design and water and wastewater distribution. Before founding Willis Technical Services, Gail was the Lakehead Region Conservation Authority's Watershed Manager. She oversaw watershed technical planning, engineering, floodplain mapping updates, erosion control, source water protection, large-scale dredging projects, and flood forecasting. She also administered the Authority's regulations and provided hydrologic and hydraulic assessments. Gail thank you for joining me today.
Gail Willis:, 03:19.840, 03:20.6
Thanks for having me.
Louis Savard:, 03:21.950, 03:46.92
Now, I mean, I said, brace yourselves that that's, that is impressive. The, the amount of single touch points that, that, that you've had, that will have or will have and has had an impact on, on what we're going to be talking tonight is, is quite, yeah, it's an eye opener. So let's get right into it. I really want to know more about this topic. So let's start off. Can you talk a little bit about your company?
Gail Willis:, 03:47.772, 04:40.91
Sure. So I founded Willis Technical Services in 2022, after 24 years of being in consulting and also being in municipal government positions, as well as the Conservation Authority, where I did a lot of community development, municipal engineering type design work. And so the company started where there was a need for design of municipal infrastructure. And I've been doing it for two years. I'm doing great. It's been a great company. We do engineering design and drafting services for all kinds of different clients. We have mining clients, Indigenous communities, municipalities, land developers. So it's sort of a nice mix that we work with.
Louis Savard:, 04:42.240, 04:59.56
And how do you, how do you see your municipal experience that you've gathered and the conservation experience? How do you see that transferred over to, cause you know, on one stand on one side of the coin, you're kind of doing it on the other side of the corner, kind of telling them how to do it. So how do you, how did that, how does that work for you?
Gail Willis:, 05:00.998, 05:40.93
That's a great question. Thank you for asking that. Interesting enough, I got quite a mix between consulting and regulations or municipal type work. Even before You know, in college, when I was at Seneca College, it was kind of a nice blend. The program that I took, it was resource engineering. So it was a blend of civil engineering as well as environmental. So a lot of my career has been sort of this aim or goal towards improving communities with the lens of environmental impacts.
Louis Savard:, 05:42.237, 06:11.2
That's super interesting. Um, so in a previous life, I did work for an environmental, uh, research Institute. So, uh, we were certainly into the green space if you will. Uh, but green infrastructure was always a topic actually, uh, around the, uh, lunch table or just in conversations because nobody could really say what is green infrastructure. You know, some people will say, oh, it's just, it's a living wall on your wall or it's a, it's a green roof or it's a, but nobody really had a true definition of what green infrastructure is. I wonder if you can shed some light for us.
Gail Willis:, 06:11.838, 07:12.26
Yeah, for sure. So green infrastructure, I mean, it's been called a couple different names. So when I got involved in stormwater management right out of school, I did a lot of conventional stormwater managed facilities. So that was sort of my job. And that was 25 years ago. And I sort of looked at that and I thought, there needs to be something different than a centralized huge pond to be built. So at that time, it was low impact development. And I fell upon that in 1999. And it really is green infrastructure or low impact developments is really about mimicking the natural environment or the pre-developed environment, not even existing but more of a pre-development situation. So we're trying to get back nature and incorporate it into our development because if development is going to happen, it's just how can we plan it a bit better so it has less impact on the environment.
Louis Savard:, 07:14.008, 07:28.49
Would you say that green infrastructure is a new way of thinking or of building to include nature and what's there, or is it a consideration of what's there even before you plan on developing something?
Gail Willis:, 07:29.777, 08:08.0
I guess a bit of both. Sometimes we don't even know what was there before. So we're just trying to improve it and deal with stormwater. So when you have impervious surfaces, houses, roads, sidewalks, all of those facilities that we use every day, when it rains, water cannot infiltrate into the ground. So the idea behind naturalized systems or green infrastructure low-impact development is really to design pockets that will take stormwater and treat it naturally as it would have before development.
Louis Savard:, 08:09.365, 08:21.67
Okay. And now on the development piece, residential versus commercial versus government, industrial, is there an actual difference between them when you think of green infrastructure implementations?
Gail Willis:, 08:23.155, 09:05.54
There is in terms of scale and complexity. So if you are a homeowner, say, and you wanted to incorporate green infrastructure techniques, so that would be more of a rain garden type situation or infiltration trench you can do on your property. All of these are more filtration type based. But in a municipal setting or a commercial or a larger residential, you're going to do larger, more engineered type systems. So as a private homeowner, you could do your own green infrastructure, whereas a municipality would be sort of a more planned out, strategically placed green infrastructure facilities.
Louis Savard:, 09:06.636, 09:19.76
Okay. And just, and forgive me here if I get something wrong here, but, um, you know, things like rainscaping and like for, for the homeowner, that's, that's typically what you could be able to do. And on a municipal level, we were looking at LIDs and things like that. Right.
Gail Willis:, 09:20.871, 10:00.34
Right, right. So a lot of the LIDs are more engineered. So you'll have like an engineered soil mix that you would use. You would consider the climate as well. So if it's going to freeze, we want to make sure that you're not going to clog up the system. Where's that water going to in the end? How is this facility going to be maintained and inspected in the future? So there's a lot more considerations. Whereas a homeowner, you know, you're going to see that every day. You can go out there and, you know, weed it anytime you want. Whereas a municipality needs a little bit more planning and inspection and maintenance for long term.
Louis Savard:, 10:01.598, 10:29.64
Okay, thanks for that. And just for our listeners that are like just tuning in for the first time, maybe LID, Low Impact Development, if you haven't watched or listened to the podcast, we've done that previously. Now, in terms of the suite of services that you offer, I mean, I read, I think, 275,000 of them in the intro. Why did you decide to include green infrastructure as what it seems like the core of your offering?
Gail Willis:, 10:31.433, 10:54.52
It really is a passion of mine. I have been doing it for 25 years. I've been involved in a lot of stormwater management projects while I was at the City. I was involved in design and construction of a lot of their green infrastructure facilities. So it really is at my core to design and sort of watch these facilities grow as part of my career.
Louis Savard:, 10:55.695, 11:04.80
So the word passion is important, right? Because once you have that passion, it's easy. It becomes easy to push forward and to keep going, right?
Gail Willis:, 11:04.804, 11:18.19
Yeah, exactly. I'm always thinking about it, to be honest. Anytime I'm doing a development project, I'm thinking, OK, where can we put some sort of bioretention facility? Where is this water going to go and how is it going to impact neighboring properties?
Louis Savard:, 11:19.035, 11:53.48
And that's an important quality to have, you know, sometimes we take up on a project regardless of what it is and it's, here's the scope, here are the requirements, it's going to start tomorrow, it's going to end in six months and then we wash our hands, move on to the next project, right? But being able to ask those questions of, Hey, what about? you know, why are we not thinking about here? What if we do this? What's the impact? What's the benefit here? Because it's super important, right? So in terms of communities, why do you feel it's so important that communities have green infrastructure and what would be some of those advantages?
Gail Willis:, 11:53.487, 12:42.65
Well, the nice thing about green infrastructure facilities is that it can bring communities together. So I've been on a lot of projects where we've designed them, implemented them, but when we go ahead to build or plant them with vegetation, we engage stakeholders, residences, and community members. So it can bring a lot of people together and it sort of provides a sense of pride in your community that you're like, you know, I planted that over there and this is what this does. And it's really important to our family and our community. So I think that not only does it offer stormwater management, quantity control, water quality control, environmental impacts, it also has benefits for communities and just having pride in your community.
Louis Savard:, 12:43.547, 13:13.23
Now I'm going to, I'm going to be, I don't know if it's devil's advocate or through a, you know, a stick in the spokes of the bike. I always forget what the actual saying is, but regardless, what do you say to the naysayers? What do you say to the people that are like, yeah, yeah, this is all greenwash. This is, this is just, you know, this is all talk. This, this means nothing, right? Who are we, like what impact is it going to have, you know, in a world of 7 billion people and, you know, uncontrolled in other countries. And, you know, what do you say to these people?
Gail Willis:, 13:16.902, 13:51.53
That's a good question. What do we say to those people? I think that when someone experiences the green infrastructure or they see what it can do for the community, I think we could change people's minds. There's always going to be citizens who want to see more roads, want to see more grey infrastructure, pavement, sidewalks, and all of those things are important, but we can still integrate nature and still have the functionality that everybody is used to.
Louis Savard:, 13:51.534, 14:38.10
Yeah, that's good. The proof is in the pudding, right? If somebody experiences it and then their quality of life changes all of a sudden, you know, they're more apt to get, you know, to get on board and see the benefits and be champions themselves maybe. Exactly. Now, if you look across the market, right, you get words like organic and bio-something or eco-something and instantly the knee-jerk reaction is that's way more expensive, right? What about green infrastructure? Is it more expensive? And what about reliability? Like we're talking about, you know, a tree in a hurricane versus an engineer building in a hurricane. Like what's, what's the reliability and then the costing side of things.
Gail Willis:, 14:38.995, 15:08.47
Right. So green infrastructure could have higher upfront costs, and then there's also the maintenance of it as well. So, I mean, it's a bit of a give and take, I think, and evaluating those values for the community. But green infrastructure could be like a higher cost, but at the same time, you would have your maintenance and making sure that it's all working properly.
Louis Savard:, 15:09.945, 15:24.03
And what about reliability? You mentioned maintenance and upkeep. How much of that do you actually have to do once you have a fully functioning green infrastructure project?
Gail Willis:, 15:24.034, 16:17.21
Well, when you're constructing green infrastructure, it's very important to make sure that the materials that you're using are correct. If you're going to specify clean rock, for example, in a bioretention facility. So bioretention facilities are introduced to infiltrate stormwater into the ground. So if you have stone in there that has dirt in it, it will it will clog up faster. So all of these things need to be considered while you're constructing them. And then you also have to inspect them and possibly maintain them. But the maintenance is very easy. I guess you could really you just shoveling out a little bit of dirt at the curb inlet. You may be replacing some plants. So it's not intense maintenance, but it does need to be done probably on a yearly basis.
Louis Savard:, 16:18.532, 17:17.32
Okay. So it's sort of that normal upkeep of, you know, even if you had a, you know, your, your
landscaping around the house, right. You're not in there every hour of every day, but maybe, you know, once a month you're giving it the sort of a spruce up kind of thing. Right. So that's right. Okay, great. Um, now I don't know about our listeners or yourself, Gail, but I know that today, um, I experienced four seasons in one day. Uh, the day started off cool, like almost like a fall-ish type of day, and then it the temperature rose, the sun came out, and then it got gray again. Believe it or not, we had a positive, a few pieces of sleet coming down from the sky, and then the sun came back. So I'm sure I saw four seasons in one day. How does green infrastructure measure up in those? I mean, we are in Canada, especially Eastern Ontario, where I am, like the temperature swings can be extreme. The cold weather can certainly be extreme. How does green infrastructure measure up to that?
Gail Willis:, 17:18.475, 18:04.84
Well, it can measure up to that, actually. So, we're in Thunder Bay, so we're about 17 hours north of Toronto. It does get quite cold up here and lots of ice and snow. And the city has constructed, I think, 41 green infrastructure facilities that I do go and inspect every year as part of my work. And so in the design process, these are considerations that you need to make sure you're accounting for. It's possible that water will accumulate on top of facilities. How is that ice going to impact any of the infrastructure? You also can design pipes underneath that will facilitate drainage a little bit better. So all of these things need to be considered when you're doing design of green infrastructure.
Louis Savard:, 18:06.135, 18:33.89
Okay. And what about those shifts? Like I, like I mentioned, right. I mean, um, I, I've have some, um, I mean, I say friends in the Kenora area and they can go from, you know, 28 degrees to almost zero overnight. Uh, so what about those big sort of extreme temperature swings, uh, blizzard like conditions? Uh, I know we're not into sort of the hurricane or tornado, but things are shifting. How does it hold up to all those extremes?
Gail Willis:, 18:34.760, 19:09.40
Well, it can hold up because when you do the design, you're also considering native vegetation. So you're really designing to pre-development conditions, which means it's exactly how nature intended with these pockets. So because they're small, if one fails and you have multiple of them, other ones will pick up after it. It's something that can be easily maintained. And I think that with climate change, it just helps.
Louis Savard:, 19:09.407, 19:30.55
Great. Now I'm going to put my naysayer hat back on, and I'm going to say that this is all fine and dandy, but I'd much rather have the oil coming off of my car drop on the road and be taken away to the storm sewer system than going down to the ground because that's going to get into my groundwater. Is green infrastructure safe for groundwater?
Gail Willis:, 19:31.459, 20:22.30
It is. It's actually intended to clean water before it hits groundwater. And a lot of the conventional systems or even like the infrastructure that was built in the 1950s when we were doing a lot of stormwater, we didn't want water on the roads. A lot of the stormwater is directed through storm sewers and directly into lakes and creeks. And so that's what we don't want happening. So what we want to redo is take that water redirected into these green infrastructure facilities that can infiltrate and all the debris, oil, grease would all sit on the top, would easily maintained and removed. And then through filtration and infiltration of plants and materials, soil, it all gets cleaned and filtered before it hits groundwater.
Louis Savard:, 20:22.303, 20:25.76
Okay. So super safe. No concern.
Gail Willis:, 20:25.766, 20:26.90
I don't have a concern.
Louis Savard:, 20:26.907, 20:48.07
Okay. Well, you see, listeners, the expert has no concern. There we go. What are the concerns then, right? I mean, we're talking about all the benefits and the positives that I think you and I both know that anything that is really, really good for any reason, there's always, well, we also have to be careful about. What would those concerns be?
Gail Willis:, 20:48.073, 21:07.81
I think some of the concerns would be lack of maintenance and just making sure that they're performing properly. Um, again, just to reiterate construction practices, making sure that they are being constructed as per design. Those are the concerns that I would have and just making sure that someone's looking after them.
Louis Savard:, 21:07.817, 21:20.12
Okay. So, so even though it's, you know, as nature intended it, let's just say it still needs to be maintained, as you mentioned earlier, maybe once a year, you gotta, you gotta do some cleanup on it. Cause otherwise it's just the filter plugs up.
Gail Willis:, 21:20.126, 21:20.7
That's right.
Louis Savard:, 21:20.766, 21:41.22
Right. So you have to maintain. Okay. Now, am I safe to say that this practice of, you know, the practice of green infrastructure or of greening is not necessarily new, but that the implementation of this thought process and the technologies that come with it, that is relatively new. Would I be correct in saying that?
Gail Willis:, 21:43.209, 22:25.90
It could be correct. I mean, I don't think that it's new because it's something that I've been involved with for so many years. But I think that there's always new technology being incorporated into it. For example, tree trenches, you know, they're almost like Lego blocks that can be built underneath sidewalks and roads and boulevards. So all of those kind of new technologies can be incorporated into your treatment train of green infrastructure and stormwater management facilities. So there's lots of new technologies coming out. But again, you can always revert back to natural solutions and incorporate all of these different techniques.
Louis Savard:, 22:27.643, 22:57.47
Okay, that's interesting. So then why, why do most people, I'm going to say, and maybe I'm generalizing too much here, but why is the sentence, oh, well, we'll take the risk. We'll go ahead and we'll, we'll implement it, but we'll, we'll assume that risk, or we'll take that risk with green infrastructure. So why are, why are communities thinking that it's a risk if, you know, it's from what I'm hearing, it's not necessarily a risk. It's more of a, you're taking that jump to the next level, but it's not necessarily a risk. So why, why would people think there's a risk?
Gail Willis:, 22:58.489, 23:15.01
I don't know why people would think there's a risk. I think possibly they might think it's going to fail and it's going to have an impact downstream. I'm not sure why people would have a risk to it. I don't know.
Louis Savard:, 23:15.982, 24:24.38
Yeah, I'm a little bit, I was a little bit puzzled too when I'm, when I was thinking about these things and, and I really liked the fact that you mentioned, you know, this is, this is not new, that some technologies are new and I equate that to, uh, uh, you know, uh, mass media, if you will. Right. I mean, I don't know if you've ever seen the picture of, uh, you know, the, the city bus with everybody on their phone and that the, that the headline is, you know, we are now, we're no longer social. We don't talk to each other because we're on our phones. And then the next picture is a, is a similar bus. years ago and everybody read the newspaper, still nobody talking to each other. So, you know, nothing's changed. The technology has changed, but the fact that people on a bus maybe don't talk to each other, that really has not changed. So what I'm hearing here is that the concept, the process, the guidelines, if you will, of green infrastructure, they're not new. They've always been around. Nature has always been around. Right? So nothing is new here, but the technologies and the processes that we're employing to implement them in our day-to-day thought processes and infrastructure projects, that's sort of where the new comes into place, but there's really no risk per se.
Gail Willis:, 24:25.533, 24:58.81
Right. I mean, we've always had swales, for example. We've always had grassed swales as a way to convey stormwater behind our houses, in between houses. But the push really, I think, is adding more vegetation to to encourage more infiltration, filtration and treating stormwater close to the source. And I think that the government is now implementing that or encouraging municipalities to take this approach.
Louis Savard:, 25:00.325, 25:23.90
Yeah, that's, that's, I mean, that's great to hear. Someone's got to get behind this stuff, right. Keep pushing it forward. You know, I mean, it's, it's, it's great. And, you know, you have the passion, but at one point passion hits so many walls that you need someone to kind of let me help you over that wall. Right. And hopefully, hopefully this podcast plays a little role into that. Who knows? We never know.
Gail Willis:, 25:24.205, 25:51.50
Who knows? But at the same time, traditional stormwater management still has a role and still has a place. So we can do pockets of green infrastructure, but there could be extreme events or more stormwater that these can't handle. And so there's still that role of traditional centralized stormwater management ponds. There's still that. It's just adding to it and making it better.
Louis Savard:, 25:52.750, 26:29.83
Okay, great. So, so, so let's talk about that. Let's talk about where this all fits within stormwater management, right? Because you know, from in a community or, or in a setting where stormwater is being managed, you know, the, the, the cement and steel way it's being managed, where, where does a green infrastructure really fit in? I know, you know, at the head of everything to minimize what's going into the system maybe, but where does it really fit in? Where would a community or municipality really realize those benefits by implementing green infrastructure specifically for stormwater management?
Gail Willis:, 26:30.993, 27:16.14
Yeah, I mean, I think that it could be as part of a strategic plan, an overall stormwater management master plan, per se, where you can identify smaller pockets that can treat water quality before it goes into the conventional system. So it's really like what we used to say, the treatment train approach, where you have your lot grading and then you're kind of having that train of stormwater management being treated, water quality, water quantity. before it reaches the outlet. And that's sort of what we're looking at here is really implementing all of these different techniques, really looking at it as a holistic view. What can we do to make this nicer, greener and improve water quality?
Louis Savard:, 27:16.147, 27:57.27
Okay, and now I might put you on the spot here and if you can't answer, or don't want to, that is perfectly acceptable. But would you say that implementing green infrastructure projects in conjunction with existing conventional stormwater management processes, that operationally a municipality could a stand to see savings, not only in operational dollars, but in infrastructure maintenance costs that could be lower, treatment costs that could be lower because you're effectively not treating as much water. And if the water you're treating may actually be cleaner coming in than it used to be.
Gail Willis:, 27:58.007, 28:17.45
Yeah, no, I agree with that. I think that is something that municipalities could look at to see, you know, what kind of cost savings or what would be the impact if we include some of the green infrastructure facilities along our stormwater management corridors, if you would, if you will.
Louis Savard:, 28:18.250, 29:32.78
Yeah. And I think that's, you know, sometimes I feel like we never ask the right question, right? The question instantly typically goes to how much is it going to cost us? Right. But really nobody often, nobody takes the time to sit back and say, not tomorrow, but in two, three, five years, what is our operation? What are our operational costs? What are they going to look like? If we have all of this pretreatment effectively happening, What are we, you know, are we extending the life of our, you know, are we replacing our pumps once every 10 years instead of once every five years now? You know, all of these thoughts, sometimes I feel are, they're lost into the discussions. So I feel it's, I feel you have to look at it holistically, right? It's a system. It's not just you do this, it's a system and you take a look at it all together. Now, talking about systems, within systems, the word balance comes up. Right. So, so how do you, how do you balance with green infrastructure where you manage stormwater, but you're also promoting ecological benefits or, or even the balances in the ecology itself? How do you make sure that the green infrastructure is now not overloading what's our, you know, the nature that's been there essentially?
Gail Willis:, 29:34.427, 30:12.41
I don't know if it could overload. I think that we could incorporate more, like for example, pollinator gardens into the green infrastructure so it has multiple ecological benefits, including stormwater runoff treatment. So, you know, you have so many different benefits including naturalizations of corridors, you have your birds and bees, if you will, like pollinator gardens, natural corridors, wildlife. So all of these considerations can be incorporated into the overall plan for a municipality.
Louis Savard:, 30:12.410, 30:53.95
So that's interesting. Let's do that just for a little bit longer. Essentially, because we've been talking about water stormwater, stormwater, water, stormwater, and more water. But essentially green infrastructure is in one word, nature, right? So when you're talking about wildlife corridors, and I remember seeing some articles where some areas of the world are actually building overpasses over highways, but for wildlife to cross, not for pedestrians to go over, but for wildlife to cross, you know, pollinator gardens, butterfly gardens, like all of these, those are all Those are all green infrastructure examples, I guess, correct?
Gail Willis:, 30:53.957, 31:06.26
Right. Yeah, you're right. They are green infrastructure examples. It's not all about stormwater, but all of these different aspects can be incorporated into the green infrastructure plan.
Louis Savard:, 31:07.614, 31:57.39
Okay. So, so again, so again, it goes back to the sort of, you know, my vision of this holistic approach, right? You're doing, you're implementing a project for stormwater management. Well, what are the other opportunities that you might have here? Like, you know, the pollinator gardens, the everything else, you have to look at the whole picture. And I think, you know, when you go back to the naysayers, it's once they start seeing the whole picture that they start, you know, Oh, well, you know what? I really like butterflies. I want to help them. I mean, I might not care about water, but I care about butterflies. So, okay. So this is good now, right? Right. What about bioretention facilities and rain gardens? What is that? Where does that play within a municipality or community to reduce that burden on the conventional treatment or drainage system that we just talked about?
Gail Willis:, 31:57.396, 33:10.07
Right, so rain gardens are usually built for private property, so they're smaller scale. They don't need to be They need to be thought about and engineered, but not to the extent of a bioretention facility. So the bioretention facilities are a larger scale. We're looking at groundwater, how it's going to connect into the stormwater management system. So storm sewers, roads, that sort of thing. It's kind of a large and more complex. Let's say it might have engineered soil mixes. It might have rock layers, it's engineered, let's say, but the rain gardens is something that you can essentially sort of dig a depression, a small depression on your property. And if you think about it, all of those sort of small depressions, if everybody has one, they would slow water down, infiltrate it at their property before it hits the road, before it hits the storm sewer, and then before it hits, you know, the lake or stream or the receiving water course. So the more people have rain gardens on their property, the less water and less impact it will have on the receiving stream.
Louis Savard:, 33:11.888, 33:32.35
And is this something that, uh, is this a service that you provide as well? Or are you strictly, do you strictly focus on the municipal commercial industrial sort of, uh, of sphere or, or if, if a resident would come up and say, Hey, Gail, I'm really interested in rain gardens, rainscaping. Is this something that you can help me with? Is that something that you would do?
Gail Willis:, 33:32.353, 33:35.21
Yeah, I could do both. Absolutely.
Louis Savard:, 33:35.214, 34:25.61
Okay, great. Well, you've heard it here guys. You've heard it here. And now we talked a lot about water, obviously, because I think it's just in everybody's top of mind with the water. Now let's talk about flooding a little bit, right? Because now the water is not being pushed to an infrastructure that could be easily overloaded. We saw what happened, was it like last week with the remnants of Debbie? All you had to see was a couple of videos of Montreal to go, oh my God, the infrastructures can't handle it. Now, where does green infrastructure play a role into managing storm waters in terms of flood mitigation? How could it minimize a surface runoff and just overall enhance the quality of the water that does run off into our waterways?
Gail Willis:, 34:26.793, 35:17.61
Right. I mean, I think that the green infrastructure, the small scale distributed many facilities, if you will, could have an impact on water quantity. definitely an impact on water quality, but in extreme events, I don't know if there's a facility you could build large enough for a hurricane, for example. So while it does have benefits on sort of the normal rainfall amounts that we get every year, and some could be designed for more rainfall than normal, I still think that there's a place and a role for traditional stormwater management facilities to help with flooding in particular.
Louis Savard:, 35:17.617, 35:29.82
Okay. So it's, so it's really is a yin and a yang, right? It's really, it really is, you know, one, one does a good thing, the other one does a good thing, but together it's really a great thing, right?
Gail Willis:, 35:29.827, 35:36.23
Right. It's, it's like a piece of the whole as a holistic approach to stormwater management.
Louis Savard:, 35:37.293, 36:00.2
Okay. Now I want to touch a little bit, just a very little bit on other green infrastructure. We've talked a lot about water. And this is a question for Gail, not for the company or for Gail yourself. What would you tell our listeners if somebody says, you know what, I really want to do something around the house. I have to start somewhere. What would you tell our listeners?
Gail Willis:, 36:01.205, 36:44.21
I think that I would tell listeners to look at their lot drainage as a first step because a lot of homeowners are concerned with flooding of their house, which is understandable. So really looking at your lot and thinking about where water goes and if it's causing any issues on your property. So if you are concerned with water maybe pooling around the foundation of your house, you could direct that into a rain garden farther down the front yard or the backyard. So those are things that you can do personally on your own property to help with your drainage.
Louis Savard:, 36:44.210, 36:54.43
Okay, so small steps, simple things. So Gail, same questions, but maybe for the listeners that are more in the municipal sphere, some final words for them.
Gail Willis:, 36:54.434, 37:15.54
So my final words would be, Keep an open mind about green infrastructure. It's something that could be explored further. Take a look at what your stormwater management strategy is. And green infrastructure is definitely a tool that can be used to improve water quality, quantity and ecological benefits as well.
Louis Savard:, 37:16.713, 38:11.46
I really like that word. I really like the word "tool", right? Because that's, that's really what it is, right? We have to stop thinking of, of things as the, the solution and that's going to solve every problem. It's, it's a piece of the pie. And like you said, it's a piece of the whole, right? I really like that. So, um, listen, Gail, your passion is clear. Uh, the topic was very interesting. Um, learned quite a few more things about green infrastructure and how it's being implemented and used. gained a completely new perspective of the role that this can play to tackle the climate crisis and create green spaces, right? We talked about a lot just water, but hey, if you're gonna do water retention, let's do a butterfly garden, let's do, right? So I wanna thank you, absolutely thank you for that. I appreciate your knowledge, the information you shared today, I'm sure our listeners do as well. So Gail, thank you very much.
Gail Willis:, 38:11.466, 38:13.24
Thank you for having me, I really appreciate it.
Louis Savard:, 38:14.028, 38:40.94
Listeners, as always, I want to thank you for joining us. Remember that if you're interested in learning more about today's topic, or if you had a topic you'd like us to feature in a future podcast, please email us at techtakes at OACETT.org
That's techtakes, T-E-C-H, T-A-K-E-S, at OACETT
O-A-C-E-T-T, .org. Till next time, bye for now.