A natural answer

Re: Insurers pave a paradisical parking lot, Terence Corcoran, Oct. 17

Terence Corcoran states that local government and engineers in Ontario are sharply critical of green infrastructure’s ability to respond to events like flooding.

Our experience differs. In British Columbia, Ontario, New Brunswick and beyond, local governments are inventorying, measuring and managing natural assets.

Healthy natural assets such as forests, wetlands and foreshores provide vital services to communities such as stormwater management, flood protection and water purification, often at lower cost.

The Town of Gibsons, B.C., for example, compared engineered and natural options for managing stormwater. Using natural options gave the same services at lower cost and allowed the town to pass along savings as reduced development cost charges.

The Region of Peel assessed stormwater quality and quantity services from wetlands, forests and meadows in two sub-watersheds. They found that these will mitigate a one-in-100-year flood and have a replacement value for stormwater services of $704 million under current conditions.

Likewise, following Hurricane Sandy, the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers pointed to better use of floodplains as central to better future flood management.

In October, I spoke at the annual meeting of the Engineers and Geoscientists of B.C. about the role healthy natural assets play in providing vital services to local governments. None of these professionals were “sharply critical” of green infrastructure.

Communities must evaluate natural assets alongside other options for services such as flood protection, not act against evidence and common sense by discounting nature’s potential out of hand.

Roy Brooke, executive director, Municipal Natural Assets Initiative