On August 28-29, Culver City Public Works created an attractive rain garden in the parkway along Lindblade Street at the corner of Sepulveda Blvd in Culver City. Heavy equipment was used to install the infrastructure on the first day; the following day, community volunteers finished up by planting various drought-tolerant native plants. The project turned a trash-strewn parkway into an attractive planted area which also converts rain runoff into irrigation for the plants and returns the runoff into the ground instead of the storm drain system.
Foreground, L to R: Steve Williams (in green cap), Surfrider Ocean-Friendly Gardens Program Captain; Chris Goodwin and Evan Dumas, Culver City High School BCR Club members and 2015 graduates planting sustainable native plants.
The demonstration rain garden project was a joint project between the City and the private property owner of the building shown. The project constructed a demonstration rain garden along a public parkway to accept storm water run-off from the adjacent property by diverting roof run-off through an underground drainpipe to the rain garden. The area of the roof is 5500 square feet. The roof run-off enters the rain garden through a subdrain pipe connected to a perforated pipe covered with rocks and geotextile fabric. The existing parkway was 5 feet wide by 42 feet long, excavated to a depth of 5 feet. The drip irrigation system was installed and planted with native plants in the rain garden.