CLINTONVILLE, OH (WCMH) — If you haven’t heard of Rain Gardens yet, you likely will soon. They are part of a pilot program in Clintonville designed to combat storm water run-off from overflowing our sewer systems and polluting our rivers.
It’s a problem Columbus was told to solve by the Environmental Protection Agency. At least 16 Rain Gardens have been installed so far in Clintonville and hundreds more are on the way.
But some residents are not happy about it.
“What happens when someone drives their car into one of them?” Homeowner John Bills said of the new rain gardens.
Clintonville is one of the worst areas for overflowing sewer systems with storm water run-off, that’s why the rain gardens are going up there first. They are landscaped basins that hold and clean storm water.
But homeowners like Bills call the rain gardens dangerous, say they take up lawn space and street parking,
“I’d rather they do what they have done for years across the country and put a new drain water system in,” Bills said.
But installing a new storm water system is exactly what the city was trying to avoid.
“These rain gardens are going to become a critical part of our sewer infrastructure,” Leslie Westerfelt with the city of Columbus Blueprint program said. New tunnels would have cost the city and taxpayers $2.5 billion dollars.
According to Westerfelt, Blueprint Columbus will cost the city $1.8 billion.
“What we are doing is really attacking the problem at its source and prevent the problem from even occurring,” Westerfelt said.
The EPA approved the plan in 2015, it includes four ways to reduce storm water run-off, from residential areas using green friendly practices like rain gardens. They will be installed in more than 430 locations all over Columbus over the next 20 years. “Our rain gardens have been designed specifically to drain within 48 hours,” Westerfelt said. The city will maintain the gardens the same way they do other public utilities.
While the gardens do take up space, the city said they are all on public property and they are trying to work with homeowners on issues from parking to the kinds of flowers being planted. According to Westerfelt solving the sewer overflow is a city wide problem they needed to solve, and the Blueprint program does it faster, cheaper and greener, “We needed to solve this problem and we think this is a really good way to do it,’ Westerfelt said.
Once the rain gardens go up in Clintonville, North Linden and the West side will see them next. Blueprint Columbus also includes installing sump pumps in hundreds of homes.Tonight on NBC 4 at 6, hear why Clintonville was chosen as the first place to install the rain gardens and how the city says they will not only solve rain run-off problems but save tax payers almost a billion dollars.
