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“Two complementary strategies can ‘green’ a community and its infrastructure: first, preserving as much as possible of the natural green infrastructure; and secondly, promoting designs that soften the footprint of development,” wrote Susan Rutherford. “Green infrastructure design is engineering design that takes a ‘design with nature’ approach, to both mitigate the potential impacts of existing and future development and growth and to provide valuable services.”

The pioneer work of Richard Horner and Chris May in the 1990s provided a reason and a starting point for revisiting urban hydrology in BC. “So many studies manipulate a single variable out of context with the whole and its many additional variables,” states Horner. “We, on the other hand, investigated whole systems in place, tying together measures of the landscape, stream habitat and aquatic life.”

“Implementation of asset management along with the associated evolution of local government thinking is a continuous quality improvement process, not a discrete task. This led us to the concept of a continuum. The relevance of this way of thinking is that different local governments will always be at different points and different levels of maturity along the asset management continuum,” wrote Ray Fung (photo left) and Glen Brown in their Sitelines article.

If we get the hydrology right, water quality typically takes care of itself in a residential development. “When the goal of land servicing practices is pre-settlement hydrology, this reduces the quantity of urban runoff discharged into a stream. It also improves the quality of the remainder of that which is discharged. In short, mimicking the natural water balance has a dual benefit,” emphasized Richard Horner.

“The BC Framework sets strategic direction for asset management and its implementation in BC. It gives communities guidance to apply science-based methodologies and tools to plan for sustainability and resilience within their communities. Most critically, it encourages communities to think about what asset management entails at the land-use planning stage, when levels of service that can be provided sustainably—fiscally and ecologically—are determined,” wrote Glen Brown.

“Stream health and what happens on the land are connected. In the early 1990’s, the ‘Coho Salmon crisis’ raised the alarm that changes in hydrology caused by land development were resulting in small stream salmon demise. The stewardship sector was the catalyst for restorative action in BC,” stated Peter Law. “Today, community organizations partner with local governments to monitor and restore local watershed health.”

“All non-domestic users of groundwater must now obtain a licence to extract and use water from wells. This requirement applies to wells constructed both before and after the Water Sustainability Act came into effect. This means that 20,000 existing non-domestic wells must now apply for a licence. While the new legislation affects everyone, most of the 20,000 wells are in the agriculture sector,” wrote Ted van der Gulik.

Communication is vital. Storytelling leads to understanding about why we need to do business differently; and this is promoting completion and a race to the top. “waterbucket.ca is providing reasons to have the conversation about ‘why change’. The resulting awareness of need will help us obtain the mandate to implement watershed-based land use planning,” stated Marvin Kamenz, Town of Comox Municipal Planner, in 2009.

“The Stormwater Planning Guidebook recognized that water volume is something over which local government has control through its infrastructure policies, practices and standards. ‘Beyond the Guidebook’ builds on this foundation by advancing a runoff-based approach and tool – the ‘Water Balance Model powered by QUALHYMO’– to help local governments achieve desired urban stream health and environmental protection outcomes at a watershed scale,” stated Ted van der Gulik.

“It is evident that there are many champions in local government; and it is important that we recognize and celebrate what they are doing. This is all part of creating our future. And when we ask ‘what will this community look like in 50 years’, we can point to the green infrastructure examples and then we will know what it will look like in 50 years,” stated Mayor Lois Jackson.