Watershed Management Group collaborated with Phoenix Hostel & Cultural Center, Roosevelt Row and the city of Phoenix to incorporate green infrastructure in a Phoenix neighborhood just east of downtown at a public volunteer workshop Sunday.
“In five hours this area will be transformed into something beautiful,” said Ryan Wood, WMG Phoenix co-op coordinator.
Green infrastructure refers to using natural systems for environmental services like capturing, cleaning and infiltrating storm water, creating a wildlife habitat, shading and cooling the streets, and calming traffic, according to the WMG website.
WMG aims to ensure long-term positive environmental resources for people and their neighborhoods as well as other areas, according to its website. They also conduct projects at private residencies, businesses, churches and schools throughout Arizona with the help of many volunteers.
Approximately 30 volunteers gathered to install retrofits along Ninth Street between Portland and Roosevelt streets. The green infrastructures use curb cores to convey storm water from the street to bio-retention basins. In addition, they beautify the neighborhood.
Romain Le Bail, one of the volunteers, is from France. Le Bail is staying at the Phoenix Hostel & Cultural Center. He was upset when he first saw that someone had ripped out the trees along the street, but then he was informed of the project and its purpose.
“I wanted to do something,” Le Bail said. “(I wanted) to help make the neighborhood beautiful.”
Mary Stephens, owner of the Phoenix Hostel & Cultural Center, said she was excited to have these basins installed along the street where her hostel was located. Stephens said she was very involved in community development, especially environmental sustainability.
“For the past two years, this neighborhood has really needed more positive development and today we are finally seeing it,” Stephens said.
Stephens’ hostel donated approximately $400 to the project. Roosevelt Row and other donors contributed to the costs but the majority of the funding came from a community challenge grant by the Arizona Forestry Division.
James DeRoussel, WMG Tucson program manager and registered landscape architect, said he has been working on environmental projects like this for the past 10 years.
This is the first green infrastructure to be installed in the neighborhood, DeRoussel said. In the past, WMG has worked on a private resident’s project as well as a church located on Grant and First streets.
DeRoussel and WMG built 24 earthworks projects, where soil is moved into different shapes, 14 rain tanks, five greywater systems, and four rights-of-way projects last year. These are all environmentally sustainable additions to areas throughout Tucson.
In the hope that these projects will become increasingly popular in Phoenix, DeRoussel said the city of Phoenix is doing research and working on eliminating the barriers.
“The city wants to encourage this rather than have ordinances as obstacles,” DeRoussel said.
WMG’s next project will take place at Rose Mofford Sports Complex, located at 25th Avenue and Mountain View Road.
Contact the reporter at cwadzita@asu.edu
