By WENDY FACHON
"How do we define civilization? How do we define economic development?
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), watersheds with greater than 15 percent impervious surfaces start to suffer negative ecological effects. In 2004, impervious surfaces — buildings, driveways, parking lots and paved playgrounds — covered 29 percent of the Greenwich Bay watershed, according to a 2012 EPA report entitled “Imprint of the Past: Ecological History of Greenwich Bay.”
Rather quickly rain runs off hard surfaces instead of slowly sinking into the ground, where water is naturally filtered to recharge groundwater aquifers. This stormwater runoff carries bacterial waste, automotive oil and many other chemical pollutants to streams and rivers and eventually out into the bay. Vacant buildings and parking lots along Post Road through East Greenwich and North Kingstown are part of this problem, yet municipalities continue to permit developers to add more shopping plazas, office parks and housing developments.
What is required for our towns to shift focus from economic/land development to revitalization?
The EPA’s ecological history report looks back on five historic periods of economic development and its impact on Greenwich Bay ecology. The report urges us to turnaround and take a good, long look behind us. Through pre-Colonial times, Narragansett natives had a minimal impact upon the land, and more than 90 percent of Rhode Island was forested. During the Colonial Period (1650-1750), Europeans arrived and began clearing land for subsistence farming. Some researchers estimate that one-third of the watershed’s forested land was cleared by 1700 and two-thirds was cleared by the late 1700s.
The elimination of trees changed the stability and filtering ability of the soil, increased erosion and caused sediment build up in the bay..."
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), watersheds with greater than 15 percent impervious surfaces start to suffer negative ecological effects. In 2004, impervious surfaces — buildings, driveways, parking lots and paved playgrounds — covered 29 percent of the Greenwich Bay watershed, according to a 2012 EPA report entitled “Imprint of the Past: Ecological History of Greenwich Bay.”
Rather quickly rain runs off hard surfaces instead of slowly sinking into the ground, where water is naturally filtered to recharge groundwater aquifers. This stormwater runoff carries bacterial waste, automotive oil and many other chemical pollutants to streams and rivers and eventually out into the bay. Vacant buildings and parking lots along Post Road through East Greenwich and North Kingstown are part of this problem, yet municipalities continue to permit developers to add more shopping plazas, office parks and housing developments.
What is required for our towns to shift focus from economic/land development to revitalization?
The EPA’s ecological history report looks back on five historic periods of economic development and its impact on Greenwich Bay ecology. The report urges us to turnaround and take a good, long look behind us. Through pre-Colonial times, Narragansett natives had a minimal impact upon the land, and more than 90 percent of Rhode Island was forested. During the Colonial Period (1650-1750), Europeans arrived and began clearing land for subsistence farming. Some researchers estimate that one-third of the watershed’s forested land was cleared by 1700 and two-thirds was cleared by the late 1700s.
The elimination of trees changed the stability and filtering ability of the soil, increased erosion and caused sediment build up in the bay..."
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