Rain Garden Demonstration Project

Centralia Builds a Demonstration Rain Garden

The City of Centralia is nearing the completion of a demonstration rain garden located on Center Street between North Tower Avenue and North Pearl Street. The rain garden was constructed by City staff, contracted services and volunteers using funding from a stormwater grant from the Department of Ecology and individual contributions.

There are four main reasons for building this demonstration rain garden in Centralia. One is to show businesses, contractors and citizens what rain gardens look like and how they function. The second reason for the construction of a demonstration rain garden is to document costs, effectiveness and what maintenance issues rain gardens may have. Third, Centralia's updated five-year stormwater permit includes a requirement for low impact development (LID) practices such as swales and rain gardens to capture and infiltrate rainfall runoff when the property is developed or redeveloped. The LID requirements must be implemented starting June 2017. Finally, the north side of this City block had some badly broken sidewalks, a curbside vegetation strip that had been filled with asphalt overgrown with weeds and trees with rotting tree trunks that needed to be removed. This provided an opportunity to show how rain gardens can improve the appearance in similar settings.

The City encourages anyone with questions or comments or if you would like to schedule a rain garden tour please contact Kim Ashmore.