This document is posted to help you gain knowledge. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think about it! Share it to your friends and learn new things together.
In four slide presentations, Restoring the Pulse explores the role of Green Infrastructure for reviving the natural regulation of stormwater at relatively low cost and high community benefit.*
This first presentation illustrates Euclid’s natural watercourses (at left) and the means by which we made them into storm sewers.
Streams into SewersRestoring the Pulse
City of Euclid boundary
Google Earth aerial viewer
In 2011, US EPA brought legal action against Euclid’s sewer utility. The EPA consent decree specifies Euclid’s Lake Erie pollution limits that must be achieved by 2025.
*
Restoring the Pulse
200th 222nd Babbitt 260th Lloyd
The larger goal is to comprehend how we might restore the natural pulse of stormwater as a means to redevelop Euclid in new, more sustainable ways.
Key to understanding Euclid stormwater is the concept of watershed or stream catchment.
A watershed is the land surface upon which rainfall gravitates to a particular stream. As rainfall hits the ground, some is absorbed as groundwater, making way slowly through the catchment.
The remaining wetness becomes runoff to surface streams, which makes quick transit through the catchment and into Lake Erie.
Let’s look at Euclid’s ‘sheds in their regional and local contexts.
Central Lake Erie south shore watershedsMost regional watersheds are wide at their headwaters and converge northward to Lake Erie.
Smaller watersheds develop in the convergence areas close to the lake. Grand
Chagrin
Black
Rocky
Ashtabula
Between the Cuyahoga and Chagrin Rivers, Doan, Dugway, Nine Mile and Euclid Creeks are miniature versions of the larger watersheds.
Streams into SewersRestoring the Pulse Central Lake Erie Watershed Group
Lying mostly within city confines, the escarpment run watersheds formed a convenient base for the Euclid storm sewer system.
Grand
Chagrin
Black
Rocky
Ashtabula
Streams into SewersRestoring the Pulse
Central Lake Erie south shore watershedsEuclid’s natural watersheds are among Lake Erie’s smallest. The streams drain the face of the Portage Escarpment across the lake plain to the lake. They are called ‘escarpment runs.’
Central Lake Erie Watershed Group
Stream-determined streets
Euclid’s topography trends downward to Lake Erie. The natural axis of descent is southeast to northwest.
In 1796, the Western Reserve survey applied a cardinal (north-south) grid to the landscape.
By 1800, Euclid’s north-south thoroughfares were established on both orientations.
The roads, such as Babbitt and Lloyd, follow nature. The streets, such as East 200th, 222nd
By 1890, Euclid Township’s northeast corner began to grow with housing and industry.
In 1903, Euclid Village seceded from the township with 3,000 residents.
In 1931, the village became a city with a population of 10,000.
In 1970, Euclid population peaked at 71,000.
By 2010, the city had dropped to fewer than 50,000 residents.
In 2015, Euclid is a ‘shrinking’ city with an overabundance of paved surfaces and an antiquated sewer system.
Nature-culture weave
Three major landforms:
The Portage Escarpment is a shale ‘massif’ capped with Euclid bluestone (fine, hard sandstone) and, above, the Euclid Moraine (a long ribbon of soft glacial debris).
Streams into SewersRestoring the Pulse
City of Euclid boundary
Google Earth aerial viewer
Euclid terrain basics
200th 222nd Babbitt 260th Lloyd
The St Clair Terrace has a shale surface leveled by the surf of ancient glacial lakes.
The lake plain is covered with soft glacial debris and lake bottom clay.
The escarpment run watersheds, like those of most Lake Erie tributaries, are wide at their headwater sources and converge toward the lake.
Escarpment run headwaters flow northward from the crest of the Euclid Moraine. Chardon Rd follows this crest. South of Chardon Rd, runoff goes to Euclid Creek’s east branch.
Very small streams drain the shoreline convergence areas.
Euclid’s stormwater catchments derive from the escarpment run watersheds, but are significantly modified.
Just as north-flowing natural streams capture west-flowing streams, north-flowing trunk storm sewers can capture west-flowing stormwater.
In result, Euclid storm sewer catchments are lodged between the major north-south streets.
The exception is on the escarpment plateau where there are no major north-south streets. Here, the small sewer catchment s reflect the natural watersheds.