Strengthening Social and Physical Connections with Green Infrastructure

Tobiah Horton (Rutgers University and Cooperative Extension)

Woodbridge Township and Rutgers Cooperative Extension (RCE) Water Resources Program partnered to build a public green stormwater infrastructure demonstration network. The goal of the program was threefold: 1) to train public works staff in the design and construction of green stormwater best management practices (BMPs), 2) to link environmental literacy and public libraries, and 3) to lay a framework of connectivity between community spaces and green spaces by linking schools, libraries, parks, stream corridors, and floodplain restoration areas. Thousands of square feet of green stormwater infrastructure BMPs were built in Woodbridge between 2017 and 2018 at the Inman, Fords, and Iselin Libraries, Kennedy Park, and Woodbridge City Hall.

Following a successful floodplain restoration program, Woodbridge partnered with the RCE Water Resources Program and Tobiah Horton, Assistant Professor in Landscape Architecture, to design green infrastructure demonstration projects at each of the township’s public libraries, public schools, and parks.

Libraries were chosen as the first sites of public demonstration green infrastructure in Woodbridge, a town of 100,000 people, due to their physical presence in the community. Project scale varied quite a bit by site, and BMP types ranged from individual curbed rain gardens treating a single downspout to the addition of pedestrian circulation systems and comprehensive site regrading.

Woodbridge Township and the local community were engaged on several levels throughout the project. Meetings with township officials were held monthly to discuss green infrastructure planning efforts. Woodbridge DPW was engaged at the design level and adapted their resources to build green stormwater infrastructure projects. Scouts led community members in the planting of over 1,000 plants at the Fords Library rain gardens. In addition, students from the Rutgers Landscape Architecture course proposed stormwater design alternatives at the Inman Library, and Woodbridge Public Library staff selected plant species for pollinator habitat enhancement.