Back in October we announced that Green City, Clean Waters was awarded the American Planning Association (APA) Pennsylvania Chapter's Planning Excellence Award in Implementation. We are now thrilled to announce that we won the APA 2015 National Planning Excellence Award for Implementation! This award recognizes a project that demonstrates positive changes as a result of planning efforts. The award emphasizes long-term, measurable results that have been in continuous effect for a minimum of three years.

Now in our fourth year of Green City, Clean Waters, we have worked to implement green stormwater infrastructure citywide:

  • Projects complete: 113 
  • Projects in design or under construction: 187 
  • Private property technical assistance requests: 450 
  • Grant funding for retrofitting existing properties with green infrastructure: $14 million. 

And some positive spin-off effects of these projects have already been documented, like the recent study linking our green stormwater projects to drops in certain kinds of crimes. Learn more about why we were granted the award by checking out the APA web page featuring Green City, Clean Waters. (Sorry, this content is no longer available)

green infrastructure graphic

The APA Awards Jury Chair, W. Shedrick Coleman, lauded Green City, Clean Waters for setting “the benchmark for meeting state and federal water quality mandates through solely green interventions” and “changing the face of the city.” Pretty high praise!

Green City, Clean Waters and the other APA award recipients will be honored at the 2015 National Planning Awards luncheon on April 20, 2015, in Seattle. Our plan will also be featured in the April 2015 issue of Planning magazine (we will be happy to autograph your copy)!

Thanks to the American Planning Association for this great recognition. But as much as we love getting awards, there’s still plenty of work to be done. Green City, Clean Waters is a 25-year plan to improve water quality in Philadelphia and create a healthier, more sustainable city through green stormwater infrastructure. We’ll be changing the face of the city—in a good way—for another two decades! Plenty more good news to come!