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Kitsap County Consolidated Housing Authority (KCCHA) completed a parking lot retrofit in Silverdale following conversion of the old Poplars motel to 32 low-income senior apartments. The work was conducted in large part with a $77,000 Washington Department of Ecology FY 2007 Low Impact Development (LID) Stormwater Management Grant.
The 2006 Washington State Legislature appropriated $2.5 million from the State Toxics Account and the pilot grant program was initiated during 2006, immediately after the Legislature authorized and appropriated funds for the special program.
The LID methods for this site included bioretention cells (rain gardens) placed at the southern and northern corners of the parking lot, which currently serve as water collection points. The composted amended vegetated filter strips (CAVFS) fit naturally along the southeastern border, where a majority of the water previously sheet flowed towards Silverdale Way.
“It’s been installed in cooperation with our partners at Clear Creek Nursery, the public is invited to come down and take a look at how attractive and functional low-impact improvements to property can be, and we’ll be speaking more to the community about it soon,” said Torie Brazitis Public Affairs Specialist with the KCCHA.
Clear Creek Nursery donated 150 hours of labor and 30 hours heavy equipment use for installation of the LID retrofit. Kitsap County Health District (KCHD) Mindy Fohn will be collecting samples and take the lead on monitoring while the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will analyze water quality samples at no cost to the project at their laboratory in Manchester.
Of the 200 stormwater systems in Silverdale, nearly one third needed immediate attention, according to the KCHD.
The existing stormwater drainage system at the Poplars Apartments had previously discharged untreated stormwater directly into an unnamed piped perennial creek. This creek is one of four major freshwater inputs into the Dyes Inlet Estuary, and stormwater runoff from Silverdale contributes to salmon habitat and water quality degradation in the Dyes Inlet Estuary. The parking lot was retrofitted with bioretention cells and compost amended vegetated filter strips (CAVFS).
LID practices have proven to be effective in reducing cumulative impacts and protecting aquatic ecosystems. LID is a relatively new engineering design approach for stormwater management coupled with comprehensive land planning. LID practices try to maintain or enhance the pre-development hydrologic flow of an urban or developing watershed. As stormwater regulations become more stringent, the need to finance the high capital cost of stormwater infrastructure and meet National Pollutant Discharge Elimination Permit System (NPDES) requirements increases the community’s burden. However, the LID approach is an environmentally sound and economically sustainable approach to address many stormwater management needs. In addition, these developments have been shown to be more cost effective.
Low-impact site design and development principles emphasize conservation of natural areas, minimizing site disturbance, reducing impervious (hard) surfaces, and utilization of natural landscape features for stormwater treatment whenever possible.
Encouraging retrofit of parking lots in a basin with proven water quality problems may result in future partnerships or action by private property owners in the Silverdale commercial corridor.
Therefore, a central goal of the project will be to educate watershed residents, developers and commercial property owners about concerns and benefits of parking lot retrofits, specifically to:
- Provide an example retrofit
- Demonstrate water quality improvement and stormwater reduction
- Validate the reasonable cost of the retrofit
- Prove the short construction period
- Determine decreased maintenance cost compared to the original storm system
Public education and outreach will be performed by both the KCCHA and the KCHD, focusing on the installation, permitting issues, parking lot space conservation of retrofit, water quality improvement, and reduced maintenance cost.
The team will hold future workshops and tours to businesses, public, and environmental groups and are in the process of producing a video and 10 minute DVD to show at these workshops. The video will be an informal documentary using interviews with experts and other project proponents who have completed one of these projects, including the Kitsap Homebuilders Foundation (KHBF) that completed their LID site development in 2007. The video/DVD will provide footage of the planning, installation and demonstrated stormwater management benefits with the objective of lending credibility and assurance that projects and techniques like these are user-friendly and effective.
The KCCHA will distribute videos to Bremerton Kitsap Access TV, Bainbridge Island Broadcasting, and other access stations state-wide; the county library system, and government organizations for use at workshops, personal interest, businesses, schools, etc.
For more information about the LID project and future workshops contact KCCHA Development Director Julie Graves at 360-535-6138, email GravesJ@kccha.org or Public Affairs Specialist Torie Brazitis at 360-535-3810 or 360-337-7186 and email brazitisv@kccha.org.
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