I went to the “neighborhood meeting” at the Community Academy of Philadelphia on Erie Avenue to find out about the proposed changes to Womrath Park. I thought I had heard enough about it but I wanted to see if there was anything else to be discovered. Yes the Community Academy of Philadelphia is not in the community but the folks who sponsored the meeting were not aware of the many venues they could have used instead. We will forgive them that one slip up.
Note the title of this post refers to a rain garden and the meeting made a good case that this is an apt description of what will be done to the park. The video below is a good primer on the problem facing Philadelphia in regard to the rain water issue. Rain comes and can overwhelm the sewage treatment facility. That leads to pollution of the rivers and streams where raw sewage can be dumped in such a situation. The solution is to clean the storm water outside of the sewage treatment system, sort of the way nature does if left to its own devices. Have a look at the video below.
Philadelphia has chosen this path and Womrath park is a natural place to implement a small scale project due to its proximity to the Frankford Creek.
Here is a site plan of the park. You can see the major changes will be to the south end.
And here you can see the details of what will be happening down at that end. We’ll post more news when it comes along.
