Happy Stormwater Awareness Week!

In collaboration with the Washington Stormwater Center and many other jurisdictions throughout the region, Kirkland is celebrating Stormwater Awareness Week from November 9th to November 16th, 2024. Mayor Kelli Curtis issued a proclamation announcing Kirkland’s participation in the statewide event on November 6th. This year we have extra reason to celebrate Stormwater Awareness Week, as the City of Kirkland’s Surface and Stormwater Division recently won 3 national awards for their work on stormwater infrastructure and water quality communications.

On October 7^th, the Water Environment Foundation (WEF) awarded Kirkland Innovation Award category for two recently completed projects: an Interactive Creek Health Dashboard which helps connect people to information about water quality and habitat in their local creeks, and the successful completion of the $12.2 million capital project at 132^nd Square Park, combining a massive stormwater treatment facility with significant upgrades to the community park.

Then on October 30^th, the National Association of Flood and Stormwater Management Agencies (NAFSMA) awarded Kirkland first place in the Communications on Improving Water Quality category for the Interactive Creek Health Dashboard, and first place in the Innovative Projects for Small Communities category for the design and implementation of the 132^nd square park stormwater infrastructure!

These beautiful fused glass awards from NAFSMA remind us what we’re capable of when we collaborate!

WOW! We’re so grateful to be recognized on a national stage by these organizations, and we hope that the attention these projects are getting will inspire other cities to explore similar collaborative opportunities.

Want to learn more about why these innovative projects are getting attention? Read on!

Some things are best kept in the vault

Stormwater vault under construction

Aerial photo of 132nd Square Park under construction

132nd Square Park Aerial Photo

 

Did you drive by 132^nd square park during the redevelopment and wonder about the big hole in the ground? Wonder what it was for? Wonder no more!

Although most visitors to 132^nd square park won’t be aware of the hidden stormwater infrastructure below, a major component of the park’s redevelopment was the installation of a huge concrete vault installed under the synthetic turf field. Stormwater infiltration vaults work by collecting water during heavy rainfall events and letting it slowly filter into the ground at the bottom of the vault.

At 248 feet long by 44 feet wide and 10 feet deep, the 132^nd Square vault can handle rainwater runoff from almost 50 acres of nearby neighborhood. Much of this area was developed before modern stormwater regulations, leading to flooding issues and poor water quality downstream in Totem Lake and Juanita Creek.

So far, the vault has absorbed 100% of rainwater runoff flowing from this neighborhood, while visitors to the park above enjoy the increased amenities of the park’s redevelopment. This stormwater park was recognized for the co-benefits it offers to the community for stormwater management and recreation. Our former colleague Aaron Hussmann wrote a great piece about the multiple benefits this park offers in March of this year. Check it out!

Some information should rise to the surface

Environmental Analyst Eve Henrichsen collects data on Kirkland creeks throughout the year. Her data is the foundation of the Interactive Creek Health Dashboard, and she was a guiding voice during it’s development.

While some things like stormwater vaults are best kept below the surface, we believe that other things, like information about the health of our local creeks, should be accessible, easily understandable, and widely shared.

That’s why we made the Interactive Creek Health Dashboard!

This dashboard is a great tool for community members to learn more about the watershed they live in (quick refresh: a watershed is area of land where all water drains to the same creek, lake, or body of water). Residents can start on the homepage by learning more about watersheds in Kirkland and brush up on watershed vocabulary if needed.

From there, curious folks can jump to the Find my Watershed tool, where they can explore how big the watershed they live in is and get an overview of things like how much of the land is covered by trees and how much is covered by impervious surfaces (areas where water can’t soak into the ground) like roads and rooftops. Those are the kind of things that can have dramatic impacts on water quality – which you can learn about on the Water Quality Index Dashboard. This dashboard shows a report card for creek health based on the physical and chemical data collected by our Environmental Analyst throughout the year.

The Interactive Creek Health Dashboard breaks down how healthy Kirkland Creeks are based on common water quality parameters. Some places have significant issues in one or two areas, such as the poor dissolved oxygen score at Totem Lake

Did you know that creeks also get a report card based on which stream bugs live in them? It’s true! Because some stream bugs are highly sensitive to many different types of pollution, whether we find them in our creeks or not can tell us a lot about how much pollution such as herbicides, insecticides, and vehicle leaks are entering our creeks. So if you want to know what score your local creek got on bugs, you can check out the Stream Bug Monitoring Dashboard.

Of course, healthy habitat and stream health are impacted by what’s growing around the creek too, so our analyst and her intrepid volunteers also conduct stream walks to do habitat assessments. Some stretches of creek are faring well, while others could use some love – you can explore how the creek nearest you is doing, and see photos from their field work on the Stream Habitat Dashboard.

Volunteers help city of Kirkland staff conduct stream walks to assess habitat conditions along the creek.

Once you’ve taken some time to learn more about your local watershed, we hope you’ll be inspired to make changes at home and on the road to reduce negative impacts to our beautiful creeks. The How Can I Help section is a great place to start. You can also learn more about the ways the City prioritizes clean water…and more!

So, what are you waiting for? Celebrate Stormwater Awareness Week yourself by checking out the Interactive Creek Health Dashboard! If it inspires you, you can take the Clean Water Pledge and commit to making some changes. Or if you’re ready to stretch your legs, head on over to 132^nd Square Park and marvel at the secret stormwater engineering below.

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It’s November, and we’re feeling grateful! The 132^nd Square vault was funded in part through a $3.57 million Washington State Department of Ecology grant and a $1.10 million King County Flood Control District grant. The dashboard was funded by grant funding provided by the King County Wastewater Treatment Division. With ample gratitude, we thank our funders for helping us launch these projects to benefit the people and waters of Kirkland.