Local communities look to make developing areas greener, safer
Cumberland, Pawtucket, Central Falls seeking out ways to implement ‘Green and Complete Streets’ strategies
CENTRAL FALLS — With Rhode Island Department of Transportation reconstruction on Broad Street, the Pawtucket/Central Falls train station and a new Blackstone Valley Prep High School facility on the horizon, some in Pawtucket, Central Falls and Cumberland are looking to make their streets safer and greener.
Or rather, they're seeking out ways to implement “Green and Complete Streets” strategies.
“It creates a sense of place. It's a safe corridor that applies for all different users,” environmental engineer Russ Dudley explained, adding, “By incorporating green infrastructure into that, we can accomplish water quality goals.”
Dudley, who is based in New York City, works for the environmental and engineering consulting firm Tetra Tech. The company contracted with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to hold a Green and Complete Streets public meeting on Wednesday evening and workshop all day Thursday. Navigant Credit Union held and sponsored the event.
Representatives of the EPA, local municipal planning departments, Grow Smart Rhode Island, the Nature Conservancy, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development attended on one or both days to learn how they could implement green and complete street practices.
Green streets are defined as ones that integrate stormwater management into roads or
rights of way in a natural manner, such as by planting shrubs to soak up stormwater. Complete streets, according to Smart Growth America, “are designed and operated to enable safe access for all users, including pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists and transit riders of all ages and abilities.”
They can serve multiple purposes, such as beautifying neighborhoods, increasing walkability, preventing flooding, and in some cases, saving costs in the long term.
Dudley noted that there are a lot of combined sewers in Pawtucket and Central Falls, which can overflow during large storm events and send stormwater directly into waterways.
One remedy is to create rain gardens – known as bioretention basins – so plants can provide the treatment function.
“We don't want to design sinks or basins where water just holds there and doesn't drain,” Dudley said.
Another option is using permeable pavement, in which a layer of concrete or asphalt covers a layer of sand and gravel, allowing water to permeate through. In response to a question from Pawtucket senior planner Jay Rosa, Dudley said it's probably not as durable as concrete but the technology is getting better.
Rosa also commented, “There's best practices that are developed by academia, and then there's on the ground how residents are using the space.” He noted that in terms of feasibility, those involved in planning must realistically identify key areas.
One concern is maintenance of green spaces, and another is that green and complete initiatives not get rid of parking, considering in Central Falls, there are 20,000 residents with 13,000 cars in one square mile.
Tia Ristaino-Siegel, a former Central Falls councilwoman, commented that informing the public of why certain features are better is a key hurdle. As an example, she said that the city still has a litter problem despite numerous trashcans lining the streets.
“I don't think we do a good job as a community drawing people together and making them understand the big issues and how it affects them,” she said.
This fit with the first of four goals Dudley outlined: engage and collaborate with the community and public officials on the need for, and feasibility of, complete and green streets to achieve community goals. The other three goals are: •Investigate and define better practices along corridors that provide safe and healthy transportation for all-expenses
•Integrate green and complete streets as a nature-based solution to improve water quality and provide long-term protection of natural resources
•Demonstrate a successful model for green and complete streets to guide implementation statewide, and encourage connectivity and continuity
On the second day, participants broke into groups to identify specific action items on each goal, along with next steps, time frame for completion, how success will be measured, and cost.
Rosemary Monahan, of the EPA, commented that she doesn't think green and com-
“I don’t think we do a good job as a community drawing people together and making them understand the big issues and hit it affects them.” —Former Central Falls councilwoman Tia Ristaino-Siegel
plete street projects will be as daunting as they seem because people can build on existing projects, such as the Broad Street Regeneration Initiative 2.0 and the commuter rail station.
Attendees expressed that they were pleased the workshop was not too abstract but rather allowed them to apply concepts to Broad Street.
The Broad Street Regeneration Initiative 2.0 involves Pawtucket, Central Falls and Cumberland, and Cumberland planner Joshua O'Neill's takeaway from the workshop was that “regional planning creates new possibilities. It's sometimes a foreign concept in Rhode Island.”
The second-day workshop involved identifying locations that would particularly benefit from green and complete streets projects, and along with Broad Street, Pine Street was noted.
Ristaino-Siegel commented the night before that Pine Street has a lot of negative space and it's very dark at night.
The next step, Dudley said, is to take the information from the workshop and develop an action plan memo to serve as a blueprint for how the communities can move forward. Monahan expects this to be finished and approved in five or six weeks.
The public meeting and workshop came about because Central Falls was one of five communities across the country – along with Hartford, Baltimore, Detroit and Manatee County, Fla. – to be selected for the Green and Complete Streets program.
The program is one of five that is part of the larger Building Blocks for Sustainable Communities program, established in 2011. In December, it selected 25 communities to receive assistance on one of five topics: green and complete streets, creating equitable development, planning for infill development, sustainable strategies for small cities and rural areas, and flood resilience for riverine and coastal communities.
State principal planner Caitlin Greeley saw the EPA's nationwide call for letters of interest and reached out to Central Falls planning director Peter Friedrichs.