11 For 2011: Queen Lane Bumpouts

PWD's Watersheds blog closes out the year with a list of 11 green missions accomplished in 2011, from innovative stormwater management projects and stream restorations to groundbreaking policy agreements and energy-generating solar arrays.

Philadelphia's first stormwater bumpouts debuted this summer on Queen Lane in East Falls. Stormwater bumpouts are just one of PWD's green stormwater infrastructure tools to reduce runoff and prevent combined sewer overflows into our rivers and streams. Runoff from the street is diverted into these landscaped curb extensions, where it infiltrates into the soil instead of entering our storm sewers. Aside from managing stormwater, bumpouts also help to calm traffic, and when located at crosswalks they keep pedestrians safer by reducing the street crossing distance.

Each bumpout is custom designed on a site-by-site basis; the six Queen Lane structures are each 8 feet deep and range in length from 24 feet to 80 feet (the bumpout pictured above measures 8' by 60'). Each bumpout is planted with a mix of native grasses, perennials and trees, and the entire system manages the first inch of runoff from an acre of drainage area. That means these bumpouts manage between 800,000 and 900,000 gallons of runoff each year.

View PWD's in-design bumpouts and other green infrastructure projects on the Big Green Map.