News Stream: WHYY on Philly’s Porous Streets

WHYY and NewsWorks ran a piece earlier this week about PWD’s efforts to reduce stormwater and decrease flooding by implementing green technologies such as porous pavement. The focus was on Percy Street, Philly’s first porous street.

“Tiny Percy Street, barely 6 feet wide, is part of a much larger plan drafted by the water department, called Green City, Clean Waters, says Deputy Mayor Rina Cutler.

‘We have agreed to green one-third of the city in the next 25 years. Which, for a city our size, has never happened before,’ Cutler says. ‘We decided we would try to do this with green infrastructure instead of gray infrastructure, which are sewer pipes under the ground that nobody sees.’

Green infrastructure can include green roofs on bus stops, rows of trees connected by underground water-catching trenches, rain barrels and other devices.”