Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association Leads the Way on Neighborhood Sustainability
Even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change brought on by human activity is the most serious long-term threat to our world and our local communities. As WakeUP has written before, there are a number of reasons COVID-19 should have us all talking more, not less, about building climate-resilient neighborhoods and cities.
Given the sprawling nature of the problem—in short, no part of society will go unaffected by rising temperatures in the decades ahead—implementing effective solutions to climate change will require cooperation across diverse individuals and groups, including government organizations, citizen groups, for-profit corporations, and nonprofits.
With that in mind, WakeUP Wake County has been laying the groundwork over the past year to build a coalition of advocates here in Wake County, and throughout the Triangle region, for the express purpose of conducting outreach, education, and advocacy on all issues related to climate change.
We’re particularly excited to be joined in this effort by the Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association (ECWA), a nonprofit located in Durham dedicated to restoring Ellerbe Creek and reconnecting people with nature.
For more than twenty years, ECWA has been working to protect and restore the land within the Ellerbe Creek watershed and engage residents through multiple avenues, including advocacy, volunteer work, land stewardship, and nature education.
Due to Durham’s industrial past, the Ellerbe Creek has been in an unhealthy state for years. And although the watershed has been on the list of North Carolina’s most polluted water bodies since 1998, it remains a vital source of clean drinking water for more than half a million people.
Recently, we had a chance to chat — virtually and over email — with ECWA’s Stewardship Director, Donna Myers, about the importance of preserving green space and improving water quality, both within the City of Durham and throughout the Triangle region more generally.
Our conversation, which has been lightly edited for length and clarity, is summarized below.
A Conversation with Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association (ECWA)
WakeUP: For those who might not be familiar with your organization, can you first tell us a little bit about ECWA and its long-term vision for Durham and the larger Triangle area?
DM: Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association is working to widen the water movement in Durham and beyond. We envision Ellerbe as a living creek connecting human and natural communities in Durham.
As part of that vision, we manage five public nature preserves for recreation, water quality, and native plant and habitat restoration. In addition, we promote innovative stormwater management to improve water quality and help residents enjoy and appreciate being outdoors in an environment that’s safe and conducive to learning about nature.
WakeUP: Preserving open green space is really important right now, not just for giving people a place to go in nature while cooped up at home during the pandemic, but also for helping keep urban temperatures down amid the rapidly accelerating rate of climate change. Can you tell us more about your Nature Preserves?
DM: ECWA has five publicly accessible nature preserves, each within walking and biking distance of a vibrant neighborhood in the City of Durham. Connection to the surrounding community is key, so we work to create a healthy stream and natural ecosystems with ties to all the diverse human communities within the watershed.
Three of the five preserves (17 Acre Wood, Beaver Marsh, Pearl Mill, and The Rocks) are along a paved accessible greenway trail, and four (17 Acre Wood, Beaver Marsh, Pearl Mill and The Rocks) are on Go Durham bus lines. All are equipped with parking, trail signs, and maps.
Our goal is to have a preserve system that stretches from the Ellerbe Creek’s headwaters, near Bennett Place, to Falls Lake, providing connected natural areas that serve as a regional attraction. Imagine being able to simply walk or bike to a natural area from your home or place of business or being able to walk or bike across the entire watershed while stopping at preserves, local businesses, and other points of interest along the way. That’s something we want to make a reality.
WakeUP: Like Wake County, Durham has experienced a tremendous amount of growth in recent decades. What kind of stressors have you noticed resulting from this growth?
DM: Durham has experienced a lot of commercial and residential development in the past few years. Some of the most obvious impacts from this are long-term residents being displaced from their homes and communities after the property they’re renting is sold out from under them or when the land they own becomes too expensive to afford the property taxes.
Growth has also affected the amount of undeveloped, undisturbed properties in Durham. As more development comes in, there are fewer and fewer natural spaces left and fewer riparian buffers to naturally filter the water before it enters waterways. All of this results in more flooding, more destructive erosion, and more damage to wildlife habitats.
WakeUP: Tell us about the importance of managing stormwater runoff. What do you think are the most important benefits of managing stormwater, for Durham specifically and for the Triangle region more generally?
DM: In urban areas, there are lots of water quality issues. But the biggest cause of water quality degradation to our water resources is the amount of stormwater runoff generated by removing trees, paving and compacting developed land, and piping excess runoff to our surface waters.
In the Piedmont region of NC, the natural water balance of forested areas produces almost no surface water runoff. Studies from Hill Forest, Duke Forest, and Camp Butner show that of the 45 inches of precipitation we receive every year, about 65% is evaporated or transpired by plants back into the air. Another 25% moves through the soils and subsoils into our streams, and only about 10% eventually goes to groundwater.
However, removing trees, grading and compacting soils, and paving areas causes water to pond on surfaces and run downhill. This creates a stormwater runoff problem that simply doesn’t exist in forests and native prairies.
WakeUP: So this is a problem that we humans have created ourselves. And not only did we create the problem in the first place, we’ve generally failed to make things better due to poor stormwater management strategies?
DM: Yes. For more than 100 years, until the late 1990’s, we dealt with the stormwater runoff problem we created by digging channels and pipes to take all that excess water directly to the nearest stream. Sadly, this approach has ultimately degraded our water quality and decimated aquatic life. Now, almost all urban streams are considered “impaired” under the Clean Water Act.
WakeUP: And of course we know that water quality issues in one town or city don’t stay isolated to that town or city alone. Given the interconnectedness of our streams and waterways, water quality issues in Durham will eventually flow downstream and affect neighboring communities, such as those here in Wake County. What do we know about the unique causes of impaired water quality here in North Carolina?
DM: In North Carolina, the main cause of stream impairment is pollution from sediment. But, since the late 1990’s, cities and towns have been managing stormwater runoff inconsistently. Under new federal regulations, states and local municipalities are only required to manage a small portion of the annual runoff we create — and then only only on NEW development.
WakeUP: That seems incredibly problematic and short-sighted. According to environmental organizations and the EPA, sediment is the most common pollutant in rivers, streams, lakes and reservoirs throughout the U.S., causing roughly $16 billion in environmental damage annually. And erosion from human land use accounts for a whopping 70 percent of total sediment pollution.
DM: Fortunately, a new approach called “Low-impact Development” aims to try and manage stormwater from developed sites by using multiple, dispersed stormwater control measures to create no additional stormwater runoff under most conditions. So, the developed site should have the same 65% evaporation/transpiration, 25% streamflow, and 10% groundwater recharge as pre-developed land.
Those who follow WakeUP’s work are probably somewhat familiar with Green Infrastructure. That’s the name for these kinds of practices. Things like bioretention, permeable pavement, green roofs, and soil amendments, etc.
Green infrastructure, implemented over decades, can help us stop treating stormwater like a waste product, to be thoughtlessly discarded, and more like the resource it really is. Stormwater can be used for all sorts of non-potable needs. We can use it to grow plants, cool down temperatures, and slowly recharge our aquifers, streams and rivers.
WakeUP: We’ve already talked a bit about stressors from recent population growth. Since you bring up the importance of cooling down temperatures, how do other major challenges, such as climate change, aging infrastructure, and racial and economic injustices, factor into ECWA’s work?
DM: The existing infrastructure is aging, and most flooding in our communities actually happens outside of the regulated floodplains, in areas where there is more stormwater runoff than the pipes can handle. We see this in Ellerbe Creek, where something like 40% of all floods happen outside of the floodplain and within 30 feet of a stormwater pipe or inlet.
Sadly, flooding and other environmental problems seem to affect lower income folks the most. Flooded properties can only be fixed with a lot of money, and those who can afford to do so frequently send their flood problems downhill to someone else. In fact, that is what the current law allows and encourages. But obviously, this is not a luxury everyone can afford.
WakeUP: On an optimistic note, though, aging infrastructure can create some interesting new opportunities to promote greater sustainability and resilience, right?
DM: Yes! As existing infrastructure ages, it creates opportunities to do a lot of great things, such as replace old parking lots with permeable pavement, replace old rooftops with green roofs, amend compacted soils, and plant native trees and shrubs, to name just a few.
But this will take a long time. And it can only be accomplished through partnerships between lots of different groups: local governments, which have the stormwater utilities to create much of the funding for greening projects; private landowners, who control much of the land; transportation departments, which control the lands with the most impact, such as roads; nonprofits, which, through work with other sectors, can innovate and come up with creative new solutions; and for-profit corporations.
Implementing more green infrastructure and more greening projects will be vital for tackling climate change. But it’s also important to stress that none of this work will be enough on its own. We’ll also need to look at regulatory changes to the federal Clean Water Act and think more carefully and thoughtfully about the way we manage land use and stormwater at the state and local level.
Moreover, regulatory changes are best when they’re accompanied by strong incentives. For example, requiring stronger stormwater management on new and existing development and reducing the stormwater fees paid by those who implement green infrastructure.
Many areas of the country have had years of success with green infrastructure. Raleigh, in particular, has taken some important steps toward green infrastructure, such as updating local codes and ordinances to be friendlier to green stormwater infrastructure and creating a cost-share program to incentivize these practices.
It’s time for all local governments across the state to examine current policies and approaches, look for gaps in regulation and practice, and make improvements that will start us down the right path and keep us there.
Learn More About ECWA and Get Involved in their Work
We’re grateful to Donna for chatting with us about the important work ECWA is doing in Durham.
To learn more about ECWA, and to get involved in their efforts to clean up and preserve the Ellerbe Creek watershed, visit their website at ellerbecreek.org.
Join Us on August 26th for a FREE Virtual Event
On Wednesday, August 26th, WakeUP Wake County will partner with the Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association and Partners for Environmental Justice for a free virtual event to discuss the ever-growing importance of preserving urban green space in Wake County and the broader Triangle region.
Neighborhood Nature Preserves, such as those managed by ECWA, are a critical tool for mitigating and adapting to the effects of climate change. Not only do neighborhood green spaces provide a convenient outdoor space to which residents can safely and easily walk or ride a bike, rather than drive, they also help cool dangerous urban “heat islands” and keep our water supply clean.
We hope you’ll join us for what is surely going to be a timely discussion about building community resilience and managing future uncertainty.