Green Infrastructure
What are we talking about when we say green infrastructure?
Is it green pipes? green roads? green lights?
It's none of these things. But first, what is infrastructure.
Infrastructure is the foundation we construct to accomplish tasks. It helps us get things done. There are all different types of infrastructure - roads, water, and sewer are called grey infrastructure. The internet and all our computers and servers are infrastructure. And... we have green infrastructure.
This is the natural stuff. Nature provides the backbone for recreation, income, habitat, and water resource management, among other things. We will mainly look at green infrastructure from the water resource management perspective in this presentation.
And just like I spoke about different types of forests, different scales of size, there are many different type of green infrastructure, some, like a back yard raingarden are on the small scale, and some, like the flood retention capacity of a rural forest, are on the large scale.
Here is development plan for green infrastructure, which allows natural connectivity through a development. Maybe this is as simple as a bike path through an area that also functions naturally.
It can involve preserving a mixed hardwood forest which absorbs copious amounts of rainfall, helping protecting the nearby communities from runoff, flooding, and drought, while purifying the air and providing greenspace and solace. Numerous studies have shown the psychological benefits of nature. In fact, studies in Chicago have shown the addition of shrubs and trees to lower crime rates in similar communities.
Mixed pine / oak forests are very typical in NC Piedmonts, providing habitat to many species and sites for groundwater infiltration, some of which replenishes coastal aquifers, taking sometimes 100's of years
Long leaf pine savannas in southeast NC absorb huge amounts of rainfall, and are home to unique and species not found elsewhere. They are also beautiful to walk in, supply hunting grounds, and keep alive a our cultural heritage of tar maritime supplies production.
Green infrastructure is an interconnected network of green space that helps conserve natural ecosystem values and functions or connects from one natural area to another. It prevents and receives runoff. And it does all this 24 hours a day.
Forests are large portion of our green infrastructure that we often remove and then put in man-made infrastructure which may or may not do as good a job. ..and are more expensive to install and maintain.
Manmade green infrastructure is great. It's time tested and it works, but like all constructed infrastructure, it requires regular maintenance. Here are 2 parking lot raingardens, both beautiful and functional.
