TUALATIN RIVER KEEPERS I Street to Stream Videos

STREET-TO-STREAM:

The problems of urban stormwater runoff

How can we stop street-to-stream pollution?

Here in the Tualatin Valley, everything that falls on the ground can be washed into our neighborhood streams. There is a direct connection between our streets and our streams through the storm sewer system.

Oil from the street goes down the drain to the nearest stream.

When it rains, everything that falls in streets or parking lots is washed into the nearest stream through the storm drain. For most of the Tualatin Valley, stormwater runoff from streets gets no treatment or filtering at all. All sorts of harmful things end up in our streams:

Oil and other fluids that drips off of cars
Fertilizers that feed harmful algae
Brake dust with heavy metals that harm fish
Cigarette butts and other garbage
Pesticides poisonous to aquatic life
Sediments that consume dissolved oxygen
Pet poop loaded with pathogens
Dirt and soap from car washing

Even if urban stormwater runoff contained no pollution it would still cause problems for streams. Hard, impervious surfaces, like rooftops, concrete and asphalt don't allow rainwater to soak into the ground as it would naturally. Instead, rain runs off of these hard surfaces to the nearest storm drain and is piped directly to the nearest stream. With each rain storm, our streams experience a flash flood that causes erosion, stirs up polluted sediments, and blows out the structure that fish and other aquatic life use as habitat.

Urban streams like Fanno Creek rise rapidly in a storm.

Our streams depend on springs and seeps, fed by groundwater to keep the water cool and flowing in the summer dry season. In urban areas that are covered with rooftops and pavement, water can no longer soak into the ground. With no water in the ground, streams dry up and heat up in the summer.

HOW CAN WE PROTECT OUR STREAMS?
Individual actions can help protect our streams. Some examples of these are:

Pick up after your pets
Stop using garden chemicals
Fix oil leaks on your car
Don't was your car in the street or driveway

While these individual actions can help, to really fix the problems of urban runoff, we must collectively break the street-to-stream connection.

Our communities need to change the way we develop. To reduce impervious surfaces that cause runoff and street-to-stream pollution we must adopt practices called Low Impact Development. Some examples of Low Impact Development are: