Save The Swales

Last year we came up with a plan to clean NYC's waterways.

The problem: When it rains our paved streets send dirty water into our sewers. Overwhelmed with this excess water, our wastewater treatment plants are forced to dump millions of tons of raw sewage and street debris directly into our rivers (this happens over 60 times a year)! Not only does this poison and deteriorate our sensitive river estuaries (home to some incredible creatures like the seahorse) it also endangers thousands of NYers who utilize our waterways for recreation.

The solution: We teamed up with the Lower East Side Ecology Center and Open Source Landscape to revitalize some forgotten pieces of land in Manhattan and turn them into permeable, runoff-filtering, green spaces...called a bioswale.

With the help of 50+ volunteers, a generous donation and ongoing support from the R & R foundation as well as the Citizen's Committee, we were able to complete four more bio-swales in NYC. This now gives the city a grand total of 1,200sq feet of citizen-built swales!

Be sure to check out our new bioswales on Allen street at Broome and Hester. Also sign up for our newsletter to volunteer and receive updates on our bioswales and other community projects this summer. Help make greening our urban spaces community fashionable!

Check out more photos on Facebook.