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Rising Waters // Green Solutions
by
Tyler Kazimierczuk
In an attempt to mitigate the growing threat of rising sea levels, “Rising Waters // Green Solutions” aims to educate the public about different green infrastructure tactics that can be used throughout the city and its alleys. The user experience is guided by the green pathway and community center through the Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood of Detroit, Michigan, a city destined to flood.
The water levels are rising at rates at which we have never seen and threaten the livelihoods of millions of individuals across this planet. Closer to home; five feet, ten feet, fifteen feet of sea water rise means complete devastation for the downriver neighborhoods of Detroit, which currently lie only several feet above the river water level.
The never-ending strain that we, the people of this planet, induce on the water systems because of our lack of care of the environment threatens to drown the low lying neighborhoods of one of the most robust cities in America. What the governments are failing to do to protect our homes, lives, and our children, is being forced on to us to deal with. The community hub and pathway would enact an army of individuals willing and able to address this growing issue. A green pathway through the neighborhood most at risk for the effects of rising waters plunges the people of the community into a system of green infrastructure solutions that can be done almost anywhere. Periodic stops along this path provide areas of interactive learning and cognition. The rallying of the people of this community is needed to exact change before it is ultimately too late to reverse what is seemingly inevitable. The penultimate space, the community hub, provides these learners with everything they need to enact this bottom-up solution to save this neighborhood with the little time we have left to do it. Green infrastructure is the only hope that we have left to stop water from destroying what we have held close to our hearts for many years, home.