When we experience rainfall, water is directed either by topography or stormwater pipes to various catch basins, either natural or human-made, across the island. One of those catch basins is the wetland at the Land Bank’s Lily Pond Park. After collecting in Lily Pond, the water travels through underground stormwater pipes down Easton Street and eventually into the harbor by Children’s Beach.
Until recently, the Land Bank’s property at 65 & 67 Easton Street experienced major flooding issues, as it is a part of the stormwater conduit route out to the harbor. The park consisted of a large lawn, meaning it couldn’t hold or filter the volume of water effectively.
Previous Conditions at 65 & 67 Easton Street
In light of this lack of water capacity, we dreamed up a better vision for this park. One where there was native vegetation that could hold and filter the water, and where there was expanded access for the community to use and enjoy this space.
We partnered with Horsley Witten Group to make that dream a reality! Together, the team from Horsley Witten and the Land Bank got to work on converting the concept into design plans and obtaining required permits. This year we put those plans into action. We broke ground in February 2024, and just 6 months later, this park, now named the Land Bank Rain Garden, is open to the public.
Today, visitors will notice much of the lawn has transformed into a garden full of beautiful wetland plants. Specifically, a rain garden. A rain garden is a shallow depression that is intentionally designed and landscaped to direct, absorb, and filter stormwater runoff before it travels into storm drains. Rain gardens contain native perennial plants with robust root systems and soil microbes that can absorb large quantities of water and filter out pollutants (much more effectively than the previous lawn at this property). This rain garden will not only improve our harbor water quality, but it will also provide an idyllic pocket of wildlife habitat given the native species that were planted!
We also took this redesign as an opportunity to improve accessibility at this site. There is now an ADA-accessible path that takes visitors through the property and an accessible picnic table to relax at once you’re done exploring the site.
We hope islanders take a moment to enjoy this new and improved pocket park!
Land Bank Rain Garden, Summer 2024